Reporting Possible Virus and Trojan Makers

[randem]

I have seen in these thread people asking question and wanting information and code on how to do things that basically only Viruses and Trojans do.

It would not be a problem but most of the people who ask these question on how to do complicated thing also give themselves away by asking notoriously simple question and their understanding of VB is not so grand (so to speak).

Now my question is should the moderators keep track of these users and who's responsiblility is it?(if any) to report such possible actions?. Further more why are some people attempting to give them the information they quest for. They almost always seem to want someone to write the code for them.


Just a few thoughts.... Now a few replys!!... What are your thoughts????

[Cyberius]

i couldnt agree more
i started reading that thread a while back about binding EXE's to other files or something like that and i knew straight away it was going to lead to trouble, i mean, it would take a complete idiot not to know. i really think its our responsibility as a forum comunity to report any future posts that have that kind of essence to mods as soon as we find them. if you think that viruses worms and trojans are 'cool', you're a complete n00by who obviously hasnt been hit by one before. give it up, you'll be caught sooner or later anyway, so dont bother

[MartinLiss]

"Now my question is should the moderators keep track of these users and who's responsiblility is it?(if any) to report such possible actions?"

Speaking for myself, I don't "keep track of" anyone (if that means looking at everything they post). I do however respond to "Report this post to a moderator" submissions which point out hacking/virus/trojan/etc/etc-related threads and also to similar threads that I come across. When I see a thread that is out of bounds I either edit or delete the thread and I let the author know why I took the action I did. If the author continues to create out of bounds threads my warnings get more severe and if necessary I ban the person.

So what you should do when you see a thread about viruses, trojans or whatever is "Report" it. Be aware however that there are often legitimate reasons for asking for that kind of information and I may not feel the same way as you do about a particular thread (although other moderators may) and so nothing may be done about it.

[randem]

MartinLiss,

By keeping track of... I did not mean to look at everything that they post. What I had in mind was as you stated, to keep an eye out for repeat offenders and what would then be done with them.

Yes, some uses are legitimate, but if the user is new to VB and can not tackle simple things... asking how to do the more difficult thing should raise an eyebrow.

If a person wants to know how to make a nuclear bomb and is not a scientist or have the knowledge of a scientist... One should be suspicious!!! Even though a scientist might have a legitimate reason for this knowledge if I ask how to do this, someone should be suspicious and not give me the info I request. I however should probably never need to know how to make one expecially if I can not give good reason.

[MidgetsBro]

Originally posted by randem
Yes, some uses are legitimate, but if the user is new to VB and can not tackle simple things... asking how to do the more difficult thing should raise an eyebrow.

When I first came here, one of my first posts was "How do I extract a string from a binary file." I asked that about 3 weeks after I learned how to use VB. I was not writing a trojan, I was writing a launcher program for Quake 2 which would launch a server with the map that you chose. It displayed the name of the map, which I was extracting from the binary map file, before you loaded it, so that you knew what map you were going to host.

There are always hundreds of legitimate reasons for code. If they do something bad, then let the proper authorities deal with it, i.e. the FBI or what not. Don't try to be a vigilante and try to stop everyone who is "making a virus." If you are really concerned, just ask them what they need the code for, and if they give a legitimate reason, just either give them the code, or give them a good idea on how to do it. We should try to keep this forum with some type of community, even though the corporate ******** are ****ing it over with their ads and other ****.

[randem]

MidgetsBro,

You got the flavor of the post but you entirely missed the taste!. There is nothing suspicious about getting a string from a binary file nor is it even remortly complicated.

I am talking about persons who want to do something suspicious and don't want to give any info on why they want this type of info and ont top of that want you to write some code for them. I myself would not give very technical information to someone who did not have the a good reason for it.

If they have a problem with that ... they can go do some research like I do and figure out or find the answer themselves.

If someone asked me where they can get plutonium. I would not tell them unless I knew what they wanted it for and they better have a very good reason!!!

However there are some that would!

[MidgetsBro]

1. I would think it's suspicious. Do you know how viruses work? They attach themselves to a binary file.

2. It was very complicated to do when I was first learning VB. I knew nothing about VB when I asked that, other than how to put a textbox on a form or stupid stuff like that.

3. If they don't want to disclose information about what they are doing, then maybe they are working something for a big company and can't disclose it because they are under a non-disclosure agreement. You never know. What if it's a billion dollar idea, but if someone else knew how simple it was to put into practice, they would make nothing out of it.

4. I agree, most people do not know what the freakin' search function is. Not a day or two will go by without me seeing someone ask how to limit a textbox to numbers only... the thing is that there are thousands of posts with that question in them, almost all of them with answers, or links to other threads that contain answers.

5. It doesn't really matter if someone knew where to get plutonium... they'd still have to figure out how to compress it into an explosive state and they would need the utilities to do that. Which are harder to come by. If they do get it all to come together and are capable of nuking an entire city, then they deserve it if they are that smart.

Not that any of that made sense... but yeah.

[randem]

MidgetsBro,

1) Just using a binary file is not suspicious. Wanting to know how to bind them together is another story.

2) Complicated is a relative term. To a beginner everything is complicated. But when you are attempting something way beyond your means. That could be potentially dangerous to others and you can not explain why you want to do it... Not with my help!

3) If someone is working on some company secret... this is the last place to come. Besides if the person can not do simple things what kind of secret could it really be? Not worth much if they let that person handle it.

5) They may get the plutonium anyway but it will not be with my help!!!

It's like the people who come to the forum to get their homework done. I did not do HW while I was in school... I am surely not going to do it now!!!