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Norton 360 Now Comes with a Cryptominer

krebsonsecurity.com

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Re: Norton 360 Now Comes with a Cryptominer

#61

Post by vegetablepotpie »

slg wrote: post #31
hules wrote: post #8

I wonder if anybody has estimations of the contribution of anti-virus software to global warming. They run on almost all desktop computers, are generally large and bloated applications that consume tons of cpu for their continuous scans, I would not be too surprised if was far from negligible.

To be fair, they also are responsible for some reduction in carbon output. I have seen people just get a new machine if their computer gets too compromised with viruses so any level of virus protection will end up keeping computers out of landfills.

A computer that is compromised with viruses is easily remedied. Anyone can just reinstall the operating system from the OEMs supplied OS installation media or the user can provide their own operating system. I don’t buy this argument that anti-virus leads to fewer people throwing their assets out. Furthermore, viruses do not affect the underlying hardware, which is what people would be throwing away. The economics don’t make sense, why would an individual dispose of an asset they bought with their personal money when there’s nothing fundamentally wrong with the part of the asset that was purchased?

Re: Norton 360 Now Comes with a Cryptominer

#63

Post by djur »

vegetablepotpie wrote: post #61
slg wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be fair, they also are responsible for some reduction in carbon output. I have seen people just get a new machine if their computer gets too compromised with viruses so any level of virus protection will end up keeping computers out of landfills.

A computer that is compromised with viruses is easily remedied. Anyone can just reinstall the operating system from the OEMs supplied OS installation media or the user can provide their own operating system. I don’t buy this argument that anti-virus leads to fewer people throwing their assets out. Furthermore, viruses do not affect the underlying hardware, which is what people would be throwing away. The economics do…

Because they don't understand any of what you just said, and they think that malware can harm their computer.

Re: Norton 360 Now Comes with a Cryptominer

#64

Post by restingrobot »

seoaeu wrote: post #28
niros_valtos wrote: post #2

It wasn’t a big thing when it was disabled by default and now it is because the default flipped?! I think this is a big issue regardless - it’s like selling a bike rack with every new car. It doesn’t seem right and enforces the wrong behavior.

Maybe I’m missing something, but what’s so wrong with selling a bike rack with every new car? Seems a bit silly, but I’d expect it would encourage cycling while slightly raising the price of cars which are already under priced relative to the externalities they cause.

It's more like selling a bike rack with a new car, that you have to pay $15 to the car company every time you use. The biggest issue I see is that Norton is charging their users a fee to use their own hardware to mine crypto.

Re: Norton 360 Now Comes with a Cryptominer

#66

Post by abrowne »

vegetablepotpie wrote: post #61
slg wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be fair, they also are responsible for some reduction in carbon output. I have seen people just get a new machine if their computer gets too compromised with viruses so any level of virus protection will end up keeping computers out of landfills.

A computer that is compromised with viruses is easily remedied. Anyone can just reinstall the operating system from the OEMs supplied OS installation media or the user can provide their own operating system. I don’t buy this argument that anti-virus leads to fewer people throwing their assets out. Furthermore, viruses do not affect the underlying hardware, which is what people would be throwing away. The economics do…

> Anyone can just

An extended family member of mine had been planning on replacing their computer because they were having problems logging in to Office 365.

Re: Norton 360 Now Comes with a Cryptominer

#67

Post by dbsmith83 »

vegetablepotpie wrote: post #61
slg wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be fair, they also are responsible for some reduction in carbon output. I have seen people just get a new machine if their computer gets too compromised with viruses so any level of virus protection will end up keeping computers out of landfills.

A computer that is compromised with viruses is easily remedied. Anyone can just reinstall the operating system from the OEMs supplied OS installation media or the user can provide their own operating system. I don’t buy this argument that anti-virus leads to fewer people throwing their assets out. Furthermore, viruses do not affect the underlying hardware, which is what people would be throwing away. The economics do…

> I don’t buy this argument that anti-virus leads to fewer people throwing their assets out

Just because you think people shouldn't behave a certain way doesn't necessarily mean they don't behave that way, though. There are definitely people out there who toss their laptops when they get cluttered with malware

Re: Norton 360 Now Comes with a Cryptominer

#68

Post by giantrobot »

vegetablepotpie wrote: post #61
slg wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be fair, they also are responsible for some reduction in carbon output. I have seen people just get a new machine if their computer gets too compromised with viruses so any level of virus protection will end up keeping computers out of landfills.

A computer that is compromised with viruses is easily remedied. Anyone can just reinstall the operating system from the OEMs supplied OS installation media or the user can provide their own operating system. I don’t buy this argument that anti-virus leads to fewer people throwing their assets out. Furthermore, viruses do not affect the underlying hardware, which is what people would be throwing away. The economics do…

> OEMs supplied OS installation media or the user can provide their own operating system

I haven't received install media of any kind from an OEM in over a decade. Commonly they're using a hidden disk partition to reinstall the OS. This can just as easily be compromised as the boot partition. So "just reinstall" skips a number of laborious or impractical steps.

Re: Norton 360 Now Comes with a Cryptominer

#69

Post by mikeiz404 »

seoaeu wrote: post #28
niros_valtos wrote: post #2

It wasn’t a big thing when it was disabled by default and now it is because the default flipped?! I think this is a big issue regardless - it’s like selling a bike rack with every new car. It doesn’t seem right and enforces the wrong behavior.

Maybe I’m missing something, but what’s so wrong with selling a bike rack with every new car? Seems a bit silly, but I’d expect it would encourage cycling while slightly raising the price of cars which are already under priced relative to the externalities they cause.

The ethereum crypto minor for many would be a reoccurring net loss (or a negative externality on the person paying for electricity).

> “Norton is pretty much amplifying energy consumption worldwide, costing their customers more in electricity use than the customer makes on the mining, yet allowing Norton to make a ton of profit,” tweeted security researcher Chris Vickery.

Which is unlike a bike rack which if enabled/purchased but never used would be a one time loss. And for some one likely to transport bikes the bike rack would probably be beneficial.

Edit: After doing some calculations for profitability with say the RTX 3070 with a hash rate of 60.5 MH/s and a power consumption of 160 W [0] at both the min and max average US state electricity prices of .1038 $/KWh and .3428 $/KWh respectively [1] is currently profitable with a return of $2.86/day and $1.94/day respectively [2] (ignoring all other costs).

So for some this would be profitable for them with a potential reduction in the lifetime of their hardware.

0: https://www.nicehash.com/blog/post/nvidia-geforce-rtx-3070-m...!

1: https://www.eia.gov/electricity/monthly/epm_table_grapher.ph...

2: https://minerstat.com/coin/ETH

Re: Norton 360 Now Comes with a Cryptominer

#70

Post by jedberg »

rdiddly wrote: post #49
hules wrote: post #8

I wonder if anybody has estimations of the contribution of anti-virus software to global warming. They run on almost all desktop computers, are generally large and bloated applications that consume tons of cpu for their continuous scans, I would not be too surprised if was far from negligible.

My CPU fan is screaming next to me right now because of my employer's overly paranoid, inefficient scanning shitware (yep I checked the list of processes). Not only is it warming the globe, it's warming this room. If I put my hands near the exhaust ports it'll warm those as well.

Since it is winter it probably doesn't matter but if it were summer you'd probably then spend even more energy attempting to move that heat from inside to outside. (Unless you're in the Southern Hemisphere, but statistically you're probably not :) )
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