On Sat, Nov 3, 2012 at 7:02 PM, Simon Avery wrote:
> Anyone else remember Macafee being caught
> paying virus writers to give them the source a few days ahead of new viruses
> being released into the wild?
This is simply not true.
(In fact, I've worked in IT security long enough to at least have
known it if such a rumour were spreading. I had never heard of it.)
Well, the rumour at the time was swimming around 1996. However - I'm going to withdraw my comment as it does look a lot like I've misremembered. I cannot find proof of it. It's possible I've mixed it up with Mcafee being found guilty of over-inflating their sales in a fairly blatant financial fraud in the late 90s. My opinion of them is they are not an honest or ethical company, and the SEC agrees with me -
http://www.sec.gov/news/press/2006-3.htm
Whilst checking, I also found this, shame it's a little tenuous;
http://anti-virus-rants.blogspot.co.uk/2011/02/ethical-conflict-in-anti-malware-domain.html
There are many other ethical issues in this industry, however, and I remain healthily sceptical of it. I believe AV companies would have paid for an advantage over over competitors in a saturated market that has existed for, what, over 25 years? I understand humans and business, and I understand why a market for exactly this would exist. And where a market exists, so do customers. But I cannot prove it and if any have done it, they've been quite good at not being caught.
Si