Universal Supplies Co.

It needs a witch to kill a witch

It was some years ago when Microsoft's Windows took off and shined on all of us. Of course, this was at our cost.

Then suddenly virus attacks started one after another one.

Some people asked me why Windows was so bad. I told them if someone wanted to take a suicidal bomb to do harm to people, would he/she went to a desert where there were hardly anyone? Certainly the target would be a market, a coffee shop etc. where there were more people. At that time, Windows occupied 90% of PC, so it is the only place attractive to the virus makers.

When Linux came out, people said that it was flawless, no virus attacks. Now, everyone knows that not only Linux, even Sony BMG's anti-piracy software that just released not long ago has more than one flaw.

In other words, everything has flaw and soon or later there will be virus. Be honest, we as users are tired of such troubles. The sad truth is that we cannot get away from our computer. It has been part of our lives for work, studies, communication and entertainment.

So where is the solution? We cannot kill all virus makers. They are clever and it is assumed that they have no job. If they have, their job must not be good that leaves them with lots of time, lots of dissatisfaction. Therefore, big software house should hire a team of virus makers and assign them the duty of attacking new software before release. If the software house is as big as Microsoft, then they can hire two teams. One group works as attacker and one group works as defender. When the defender won, then the product can be released.

Some may say that there will be some other virus maker with a higher attacking skill. Of course, this is already true that we have newcomers with better talent. If so, then fire the weak one and replace the post with a better one.

We think that this suggestion is nothing new. There are movies and stories about hiring criminals with special technique to act as spies for secret missions. There is also an old Chinese saying that having a devil to suppress a devil. It is certain that only those who belong to the same nature can understand their technique.

F. H. Tong, Nov. 17, 2005