Denial of Service versus “Attacks”
There are two broad classes of “security” problems
- 1) Deliberate attacks - NPAC suffered this 2 years ago when a hacker used a trapdoor to login into a Sun machine and remove all the files on three computers. For Java, these are called “attack applets” by Felten.
- 2)Denial of Service: these include internet activities that stop desired use of your computers by hogging resources, invading your privacy or just annoying you! These are called malicious applets by Felten
- NPAC suffered denial of service when a flood of unwanted “junk” email from forged addresses caused some of our servers to go down
- I get annoyed when I or my children get unwanted email advertising pornographic sites
- This is the basis of the recent “Melissa” virus