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Admin
rm -rf /default_comment
Admin
Someone doesn't know about EDID and its capabilities.
Admin
what actual version had Carl had? C99? C11? ANSI C?
Admin
Nor USB, and its capabilities.
Admin
I once got a virus over 3.5 audio jack. In general inserting any widgets into slots can always lead to viruses. My man Carl knows what he's talking about.
Addendum 2019-04-23 07:13: Not to mention VGAs. Very risky, they are.
Admin
I was expecting Carl to acquire a virus after the guru gave back the USB stick. Where is the embellishment when you need it?
Admin
Don't slag church IT until you've tried to get volunteers to do it. Seriously.
Admin
It's not a wtf. If you were giving advice to the not very technical guy who's been lumped with looking after 'the computers' you tell him not to let anyone plug anything into the network. There are a few edge cases where that errs on the side of caution.
I guess next time they have to get someone in to deal with their malware problem, they'll learn about USB sticks too.
Admin
"Look, look! I'm touching your monitor cable to my computer case. I'm giving you a virus! Ohhh, too bad there it goes!"
Admin
Nah, instead his anti-virus will kick up an alert when he puts his memory stick back in his computer. So he calls the "IT guy" from the church to let him know of the potential problem, but is met with denial. IT Guy: No, you must have picked that virus up some other way. There is no way this computer could pick up a virus. I don't connect it to the Internet or nothing. Carl: Well the memory stick was clear before it went in your computer and it is infected now and the only thing it got plugged into in the meantime was your computer. Please humour me and would you run a full scan of computer on your anti-virus program. Wait, you said you don't connect to the Internet with that computer? IT Guy: That's right. That way an infection can't get in there. Carl: So when did you last run Microsoft Update or updated your anti-virus? IT Guy: The anti-virus on my machine is state-of-the-art and stays up-to-date automatically. Carl: Right, when you connect to the Internet so it can download the updates from the publisher. IT Guy: Oh, all right. I'll try it. But I assure it, it will be clean. Okay, it is started. There, the notice and it starts scanning. It estimates it will take 24, 20, 17, 13, 9, 7, 5, 4, 3. Yeah, about 3 hours. Carl: What notice did it give you? IT Guy: Oh, it's just saying that it will update its definitions when I next connect and then started scanning. It will take a while, but it has always been clean. If you want I will call you with the results when it is done. IT Guy: Oh, it is just telling me that
Addendum 2019-04-23 08:03: Oops: Ignore the last (incomplete) line.
Admin
To what?! A Commodore C64? I call BS
Admin
That fella needs to get his hands on a dongle
Admin
I was once a young academic working on a project funded by a US army research facility. Our software run on Linux laptops. At some point they needed a distro upgrade but their local "certified Linux" support seemed to be having trouble and were willing to fly me across the country to fix it. A couple of days before I was to fly out the real problem came out: you are not allowed to connect the machine to the Internet, that's too dangerous. But, guys, I am going to connect to an approved repository, with checksums checks for integrity. That's the sanest way. -- No, no, no, too dangerous, network connections cannot be approved for this.
The final solution was proposed by their computer security folks and I made them put it in writing. I took my personal laptop to a friend's house in the area (they suggested a coffee shop originally), downloaded the required distro packages over her network, copied them onto a CD and used that CD to install. Because obviously using a CD with an unverified distro was much safer than connecting the laptop to a network for an upgrade.
Admin
Completely agree re church IT resources. Especially in the average-sized church (less than 50 average Sunday attendance) in the United States. IT people are expensive and only megachurches have that kind of money.
Church volunteers try their best, but often they're not IT people at all. (Or they're retired IT people, like the old mainframe programmer trying to deal with modern PCs.) Sometimes they're doing it because they're the only one in the church who knows how to use tabs in Word instead of spaces.
Of course, top level management in churches has a lot in common with top level management in businesses. For six months, my church's statewide organization had a real IT guy on staff. Knew networking, streaming, electronic conferencing, security. He was on staff part time only, and supposed to be a resource for the 40 or so churches in the organization. He was doing great.
Then the top-level management decided they didn't need any IT resources. "Church volunteers can handle it." So they let him go.
Been expensively going downhill ever since.
Admin
Love the title. Someone grew up in church... :)
Admin
Obvious trap is obvious. This "IT guru" is in fact a mastermind hacker who is socially engineering unsuspecting presenters into installing malware on their USB sticks.
Admin
Flashbacks, wow.
I can sympathize. No doubts this "IT guru" is every bit as moronic as he sounds, but I was that shleb at one point. One of my first jobs was supporting a small organization who recognized they needed an "IT guru", and naturally that title went to the youngest member of their staff ( me ). Being inexperienced, they then proceeded to tell me how do to my job...poorly. One of their dictates was, in fact, no external system connections. Period. Of any kind. Mind you, this was during a time when laptop were measured in pounds, but even then we had projectors to hook things up to...which of course wasn't allowed.
So how did external vendors get their stuff on to our screens? They didn't, unless they felt like recreating their project on our equipment ( yes, we gave them that option ).
I felt like a huge moron having to inform them of these restrictions, but hey; I was in IT!
Admin
I did some non-it work - it pays better and fewer WTFs - for a local synagogue recently. Having finished the job I was standing around in their office chatting when the nice lady there had some 'computer problems', and because I had time to kill i took a look at it. Nothing unusual by support standards, they'd come up with a fubar process that made something simple into a complicated task that failed regularly - printing to the other printer via scanning a printout in again, that kind of thing. So I spent 15 mins working it out, and showed them the right way.
Obviously I didn't charge, but I did joke with them about how I didn't want the work and would charge my full rate in future, which is much higher than support rates.
They called me back a few weeks later anyway and tried to get me to do some more it stuff for them, at which point I reminded them of my price. Their response? Please do the work, our internal it is useless and we're not allowed to pay external it support, but your invoice will be for [other work] so we can just pay it. I could have set up a contract with a 3rd party support co, billed the synagogue 5x the cost, and as long as I invoiced for 'facilities maintenance' instead of support they'd have been happy. I found that a bit too dishonest, so turned them down - but a friend of a friend knows the synagogue treasurer, so I put in a word and got the support restriction lifted.
Happy ending, the synagogue staff now think I can fix any problem, and regularly call me for jobs I want.
Admin
@Mr. TA: Do tell us more about that virus you once received via 3.5 audio jack.
Admin
I've received an earworm via 3.5 audio jack, does that count?
Admin
The difference is that this guy is clearly an "expert beginner" and will forever be "that shleb".
Admin
3.5mm Jack was diseased as well as tiny. Worst Grindr date ever.
Admin
I guess they grabbed the IT guru from the set of BSG, that show where the Cylons can attack you wirelessly the moment you run a cable between machines. "Network is broken! Computers restored to local control."
Admin
My PC never gets viruses because I always put a condom over my USB stick.
Admin
If this was a Military installation, then outside internet is probably banned by policy.
Yes, downloading those images might be safe, but even with a good firewall a live connection is a vulnerable entry point.
Just check all warning on exploits in Cisco and other appliances.
So a Live connection would probably be scanned and possibly hacked in minutes from connection even without downloading.
In really secure installations you even have to add extra sound proofing, separate power and no windows and no cell phones.
I read a test they did where a virus that got in through an USB to a computer that was not connected to the internet still managed to send info out by controlled reading and writing to harddrive which caused morse like sounds that was picked up by a hacked phone with an internet connection.
So yes the military do have to keep things separated.
Admin
Oh, I should have said - the laptops were allowed to connect to the internet after the upgrade. It was only "connections to download software are not secure but CDs are secure" problem. They run a script to verify "no rhosts files" and a bunch of obvious issues like that, but no actual checking of binaries installed, and declared it safe then and there.