Microsoft has confessed that a flaw in Internet Explorer was "one of the vectors" used in the attack on Google, with an investigation by McAfee revealing some of the details.
McAfee has been brought in by a number of companies attacked, and they insisted that there was nothing to substantiate the claims that Adobe's notorious PDF software could be responsible.
"We have never seen attacks of this sophistication in the commercial space," said Dmitri Alperovitch, a Vice President of Research with McAfee.
"We have previously only seen them in the government space."
IE flaw
Microsoft confirmed that IE was partly at fault, rather worryingly suggesting that users could avoid any problem by using protected mode and the highest security settings.
"The company has determined that Internet Explorer was one of the vectors used in targeted and sophisticated attacks against Google and other corporate networks," Microsoft said.
CEO Steve Ballmer deflected a little attention when he was interviewed on CNBC.
"We need to take all cyber attacks, not just this one, seriously," said Ballmer.
"We have a whole team of people that responds in very real time to any report that it may have something to do with our software, which we don't know yet."
Via Reuters
Your comments (7) Click to add a new comment
lovlid
January 17th 2010
7. @ jjdoran.
Yeah, because the hackers would have just put their hands up in defeat at the site of firefox. Prat.
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jjdoran
January 17th 2010
6. www.mozilla.com
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ripsnorter
January 16th 2010
5. Actually, people, I was referring to myself! But Apple? Nah! Apple is cute and fluffy!
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lovlid
January 15th 2010
4. @ serendipity
"prepared to go to any length to preserve its monopoly on power"
I think he's talking about having to send your ipod/phone back to have the battery changed;)
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serendipity
January 15th 2010
3. @ripsnorter
"I mean, we're talking about a dictatorial entity with no genuine mandate from the people, no respect for the rights of others, prepared to go to any length to preserve its monopoly on power and ruthlessly crush all opposition and dissent."
Do you mean Apple? :-))
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anteaus
January 15th 2010
2. The main mistake people make in this respect is that of having too much faith in AV software. They forget that AV software relies on pattern-recognition, so it will not detect custom malware.
Best advice is to:
Use a more secure browser.
Only install plugins you actually need.
Ensure plugins are updated, but ONLY update directly from the official source. (some update-prompts on webpages are themselves spoofs)
Do your browsing as a limited user.
Oh, and only visit Chinese websites if you really, really must.
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ripsnorter
January 15th 2010
1. Is anyone suprised by this? Really? I mean, we're talking about a dictatorial entity with no genuine mandate from the people, no respect for the rights of others, prepared to go to any length to preserve its monopoly on power and ruthlessly crush all opposition and dissent. And as for China...
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