[ubuntu-uk] How to write a Linux virus in 5 easy steps?

[Matthew Wild]

On Wed, Feb 11, 2009 at 10:10 AM, Michael Holloway
<michael at thedarkwinter.com> wrote:
> On Tue, 2009-02-10 at 22:14 +0000, alan c wrote:
>>
>> I trust it will not be long before I can feel just a little safer?
>> comments welcomed.
>
> I think something like "distro level security" could be implemented,
> where ubuntu (/rh/suse etc) maintain say an md5 list of all binaries
> available from the repositories (or just the installed ones), and before
> executing a file check if it exists in the hash file, and matches, and
> then execute or warn.

I hope it is /not/ MD5, which has been 'cracked' for a while now ;)

http://www.mscs.dal.ca/~selinger/md5collision/

In principle however, your idea would work well in practice. It's even
quite possible to do today.

I would like to see SELinux/AppArmour taken that little bit further
too. I still refuse to run anti-virus on Linux, I *don't* need it :)

Matthew.