Linux antivirus story and question.

[kachilda]

I have a story for you. About 15 years ago give or take just after Windows 98 came out I was on a forum asking a newbie question about getting a knew feature that came out with win 98. I was running win 95. One of the folks on the forum got tired of me and after asking me what antivirus I was running he was kind enough to send me a virus which wiped out my windows operating system but not before I downloaded and burned a live red Hat operating system to a CD. Red Hat at the time wanted to prove that linux specifically Red Hat linux could run on a computer just as will as windows. so having lost my windows 95 operating system I booted up the live Red Hat linux CD I had just made and went back to the same forum asking the same dumb newbie questions and the same person after asking me what antivirus I was running and then at my silence telling me it didn't matter sent me another virus. Well. Red Hat linux recognized it was a virus rejected it and sent it back to it's source all without telling me a thing and the next I,M I git from this guy was what did you do what did you do to my computer you destroyed it what operating system are you running. So with some satisfaction and a hearty laugh I told him I was running a live version of Red Hat linux - I bet he uses linux now. Just a thought. So I was wondering does anyone know what program or app Red Hat was using that would do that? That was pretty cool and it's what finally sold me on linux so I was wondering what the program or app was that they used. Any ideas give me a shout. Thanks.

[xenopeek]

I highly doubt that is what happened as that would have been legally rather risky on Red Hat's part. I think your memory is playing tricks on you and exaggerates what happened 15 years ago. It's one thing to do what you can to detect malware and block it and possibly its source; it's something else entirely to automatically and without human intervention "hack back".

[kachilda]

So You don't know what the program or app was thank you for your feed back. There may have been a pop up asking me if I wanted to except it prior to this but it did happen.

[deepakdeshp]

So You don't know what the program or app was thank you for your feed back. There may have been a pop up asking me if I wanted to except it prior to this but it did happen.

In my opinion it is impossible..You cannot find a similar incident on the net too.

[kachilda]

The only other things I can think of that may have happened or 1 he screwed up and infected his own computer or 2 someone else sent him a virus. ether one would leave me asking why it happened right after he asked me what antivirus I was running and then telling me it didn't matter. Yes it was 15 years ago but I do know what happened. I guess I should post the question for Red Hat and see if they tell me Ive gone senile as well. I'll post back if they answer me. Thanks for the feedback

[BigEasy]

Soometimes 15 years ago, someone told you something in some forum. Now you waiting what Rad Had thinks about it. Good idea. Hope their answer will adequate.

[MartyMint]

What an incredible story.

[Amii_Leigh]

Actually...I don't think this is unbelievable at all. Remember what year we're talking about here. IRC chat was still used back then. I'm thinking this script kiddie thought he was being smart and sent a vbs script to our friend here. Kachilda thought it was his operating system at fault, and so installed Linux Red Hat which used a different kind of chat setup entirely, one which connected, but also gave him options of what to do with incoming connections and possible downloads. When Kachida got the second vbs worm, decided not to accept it, and returned it to the sender using his chat client. The recipient's chat client didn't give any options as to whether or not accept downloads on a per message basis, and didn't even see it returned. BUT he saw the effects on his system.
This is the only explanation I can think of, since I'm a tiny bit experienced with using pIRCH (PolarGeek's IRC Hack) since for the first couple years I used a computer I used pIRCH to chat in a place called (now long since disappeared from the internet) Chat City. I used to use it for making nice fireworks and flowers in the chat room. I knew it could also be used for sending files, though I never used it for that.
The people I chatted in the chat room with were all very well behaved (usually) and never did anything naughty like sending out vbs scripts.But we all heard about it. I'm surprised none of you ever heard of that stuff going on.
Check out pIRCH here
About .vbs attacks:

[samriggs]

There was also another one going on back then I can't remember the name now we used to call it the house cleaner, I used it once to get rid of a file but you had to be careful as was in my case I forgot to get rid of it afterwards, it got set off somehow and lost the whole hard drive, had to do a complete reinstall, ya I was stupid back then
I forget what I did to set the stupid thing off it was way back in win98/xp days.
it was also used for obvious reasons but this is also what could of happened, there was no stopping it once it started rolling, I tried.

Might of been the guy setting it off himself by mistake if it was laying in his system somewhere, it wasn't hard to do.
it was around that time period or one of the vb scripts kicking around at that time .

Taught me never to use that again to remove a stupid file.

Good ole lack of knowledge

[kachilda]

Those are all interesting replies. I contacted Red hat and they never got back with me. If they ever do I'll post there reply. I didn't consider scrips but that's a good possibility. i was hoping it was a program or app I could add for extra protection and just because the Idea seems pretty cool but I guess in Linux I don't really need it. Thanks for all the feedback. I'll keep you updated if there is anything to report which doesn't seem likely but who knows.

[Divine_Serpent]

Well, I did chuckle at the story anyway. It was cute, after all.

[Leonzio]

Nice thread, we are not alone.

[o-l-d]

There was an exploit for windows back then that was called WinNuke. It would automatically start deleting the Windows System folder one item at a time and there was no way to stop it. You could embed or hide it within a jpg or other image file and opening/viewing the image file would activate it. Since there was no Windows System folder in Red Hat it was useless. I can't say how it got mirrored back to the sender but it is funny.

[Divine_Serpent]

I can't even remember the last time I had a real virus or a piece of malware that actually caused me a headache. I remember the "I Love You" email back in the XP day's, and that's about it.

[kachilda]

There was an exploit for windows back then that was called WinNuke. It would automatically start deleting the Windows System folder one item at a time and there was no way to stop it. You could embed or hide it within a jpg or other image file and opening/viewing the image file would activate it. Since there was no Windows System folder in Red Hat it was useless. I can't say how it got mirrored back to the sender but it is funny.

When it was sent The Redhat OS popped up a message telling me it was there and asking me if I wanted it and since I didn't know what it was I said no. I think that's how it was sent back to the sender.

[CoffeeFiend]

Cool story. I think there is a possibility that something happened. Remember, the 90's were the Wild West days of the Interwebs. Online chat rooms were a great forum for script kiddies and wannabe hackers to wreak havoc. Fun times!