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Bill Gates has actually launched some sort of campaign, with bounties on virus makers, tho I wonder if the complex MS Op System, with too much focus on speed in the performance of tasks, at the expense of time for considering whether I really want to do whatever ill-defined issue it is the computer is asking me to decide on ?
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What are you trying to say here?????
(it's a little hard to decipher..sorry if it's just me).
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Is there such a thing as Safe Computing?
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Yes. Well, sort of. It's not really a fair question because Joe Average doesn't understand the computer to the degree of the techie, geekie types....Nor should they.
That said, you wouldn’t get insurance for a break-in where you left the door to your house unlocked. People should share some burden of responsibility.
Many viruses, trojans and cons are weapons of social engineering and preys on human curiosity (or stupidity). You'll never completely eliminate that. It's impossible without regulation for who can and cannot buy a pc (would have to be a gov certified owner) and even then viruses would thrive because people make mistakes.
The computer should have been rebadged into just a piece of business office equipment and the home user should never been able to purchase one unless they were a business or university.
All the necessary tools for "safer" computing are available now but are either turned off by default or hard to understand/setup (for the average person) or harder to find. You could hire someone to set it up for you, but that costs money and people are cheap. If the government steps in and forces PC's to be locked down before purchase...the cost will go up (I'm talking DELLS and HP's not the DIY). Most of the necessary tools are free and that's a mind-blowing fact. Antivirus (AVG), firewall (ZoneAlarm, Sygate) on EVERY unsecure pc out there would probably eliminate 90-95% of the security problems (SPAM is a whole different kind of annoyance but not a security risk). The last 5-10% would be easier for security companies to focus on. Kinda like, if most people bought the club, car theft would drop dramatically (since joy riding is a major factor in theft), eliminating the unsophisticated "punk" (the majority of car thieves).
Yup the OS is full of holes and should just patch by default. Gates already made activation a permanent step, so why stop there? Push patches out automatically and install (no questions asked). Send the consumer a nice little message kindly asking them to reboot and life will go on. (The problem with this is that sometimes patches create bigger problems than they solve). Still, it's probably the lesser of 2 evils.
No clear answers, eh?
Convergence is putting the PC into the AV rack but it's taking time. To most average people (users is a dirty word) it's a glorified typewriter that let's them download email and surf the web...That's been done in a set top box several times but greed set forth and it didn't take off due to extra expenses for network service.
The PC is here and here to stay and it's slowly evolving.
If they can turn the PC into a set top box that one day turns on in one second or less. A PC that eliminates a persons ability to save information to it or saves it in a truly secured way for online shopping (newer algorithms required). If they can eliminate filemanagers and the rest of the complexities that plague Windoze run Pc's. If they can have more of an HP media PC or MyHTPC style interface and the owner is never allowed to enter "behind the scenes", then you may have "safer" computing. That's a bundle of "ifs". It ain’t' gonna happen though, because people don't like that level of control.
