Anti Virus, now Anti Spy-ware

[Steve Lamb]

On Wed, June 18, 2008 10:51 am, Steve Lamb wrote:
>     This is where you make the mistake of equating Windows threats with
> Linux.  If one's user space is infected one doesn't need to reinstall
> the OS.  One simply need a different user account, elevate to root,
> remove the infection.  I only say a different user account because one
> has to presume the current one is compromised.  One of the pitfalls of
> Ubuntu's policy of a non-functional root password.  No way to get into
> root without a non-compromised normal user.  But I digress.  The point
> is that cleanup is exceptionally easy by comparison.

    To answer myself I realize now why this is not as bad as it seems.  I
previously mentioned that malicious software that wants to run at
"login" needs to inject itself into 4 different ways of logging in
graphically.  So to get around it without another user account one can
simply change to a different session type to see if one can log in there
without the malicious software starting up.  If that fails or one
doesn't have multiple session types to choose from there's always
CNTL-ALT-F1 and logging in from the CLI.

-- 
Steve Lamb