Virus gets one guy in a LOT of trouble!

[alanp]

This is an alarming story; really horrible stuff.  A computer virus framed this guy for collecting child pornography on his computer.   I would be scared to run windows on a PC that accesses the Internet because of things like this.

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_TEC_A_VIRUS_FRAMED_ME?SITE=OHALL2&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT

[alanp]

Well, I reread what I wrote about windows, and maybe that sounded a little harsh.

No question everyone on this board could run a Windows PC connected to the internet with habits and precautions to stay relatively safe.  We keep an open ear to the tech world.  But when I think about my parents running a Windows PC, this kind of story really worries me.  My Mom clicks links in emails, my Dad visits the torrent sites to download an episode of a TV show his missed.  They run XP so they are running as administrator, they both use internet explorer and don't even have firefox installed, and so on.  I cringe when they do that stuff.  I've tried to teach them why it's unsafe and it just goes right in one ear and out the other. Then I get phone calls from them asking questions about virus like symptoms.  But that's most windows users and techies are such a minority that I can't recommend using windows, to a novice user, who plans to put it on the internet.  I've tried to sell them on the idea of switching to linux.  They think it's ugly and hard to use.  My mom just doesn't like look and feel the mac.  And they don't even want to upgrade to the current edition of windows. 

[Rico]

Keep in mind that there are a LOT of pc's connected to the net - and I mean a lot.  Even if you are not the most tech savvy person, your odds of having something like this happen are pretty small.  But you are correct, there are a lot of people going online that don't have a clue how to protect their sensitive information and their computer from troubles.

P.S.  One thing that gets me about cases like the above is why don't they go after the source - and not the PC/people that get the child porn on their machines?  I know many of these machines are off-shore and untouchable but there must be a better way to attack this problem.