ABC avoids uttering the 'W' word

Sam Varghese
Tuesday, 18 August 2009 07:24

Opinion and Analysis

What's the one word that comes to mind when people discuss worms, viruses, spyware, malware and botnets?
Anyone who's not been living under a rock for the past decade knows that one can't start talking about such subjects without a mention of Windows, the glue that binds them together.

But when it comes to the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, it is perfectly possible to go through a 45-minute programme on just these topics and avoid any mention of the W word.

The programme, titled "Life in the Fast Lane" and broadcast on August 17, was structured around the premise that cyber criminals are taking over the internet - and given that Australia is planning a fast network, we are likely to be bigger targets in the future.

(As an aside, this network has been talked about for at least two years, but given that the communications minister appears to be more preoccupied with content filtering - which will cut whatever speeds already exist - it is probably safe to conclude that we will not see any kind of fast network for at least another 20 years.)

Cyber crime is very definitely on the increase. No doubt about that at all - organised groups are using phishing techniques to steal online banking and other details and then stealing money.

There are other groups which use botnets to stage distributed denial of service attacks and extort money from companies for whom an online presence is a must.

The programme discussed a few cases - where people were subjected to DDoS attacks, or had their details stolen and lost money.

But all this has been going for nearly a decade. The existence of chatrooms and forums where people negotiate to hire botnets, trade stolen credit card numbers and sell software vulnerabilities is old hat.