<div dir="ltr"><div class="gmail_quote">On Fri, Aug 8, 2008 at 5:12 PM, Drew from Zhrodague <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:drew@zhrodague.net">drew@zhrodague.net</a>></span> wrote:</div>
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<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="PADDING-LEFT: 1ex; MARGIN: 0px 0px 0px 0.8ex; BORDER-LEFT: #ccc 1px solid"> As a sysadmin, and tailing logs all day, I see tens of thousands
<div>of ssh attacks from China (220/8 and 221/8?) and possibly other places</div>
<div>every day on every host. Is this the chinese government doing this or</div>
<div>isolated crews? I suspect the latter, but it is still unnerving.</div>
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<div> Too bad it is against the law to attack back!</div>
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<div class="gmail_quote">Another possible explanation for this is that there are a vast number of compromised systems in China. Of course, there are vast numbers of compromised systems in the US, but I think ISP's here are getting proactive about shutting down the zombie's connection.</div>
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<div class="gmail_quote">That is, the person with whom the attack originates could be anywhere controlling a distributed network. The attack may originate from China or Italy or Russia, but the attacker could be anywhere.</div>
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<div class="gmail_quote">A little off topic, but I think you would definitely have to concede that cell phones could be remotely monitored. For example, the cell phone operator pushes out a patch to the software for the phone. This patch tells the phone that when it is turned off, it should turn off the screen and not ring for new calls. However, in the "appears to be off state" it should listen for a control message that tells the phone to turn on the mircophone and start transmitting. </div>
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<div class="gmail_quote">A little more off topic... If you think the next war will be waged via the internet, I'd encourage you to read John Keegan's "The Second World War." Manufacturing capacity and the ability to mobilize industry was the deciding factor then, my money says that it still is. First strikes and reducing the means of communication may help win battles, but wars are won through attrition.</div>
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