Study: Unpatched PCs Compromised in 20 Minutes

17 Aug, 2004 at 10:29pm ET Article published in Tech

Don’t connect that new PC to the Internet before taking security precautions, researchers at the Internet Storm Center warned Tuesday.

According to the researchers, an unpatched Windows PC connected to the Internet will last for only about 20 minutes before it’s compromised by malware, on average. That figure is down from around 40 minutes, the group’s estimate in 2003. The Internet Storm Center, which is part of the SANS Institute, calculated the 20-minute “survival time” by listening on vacant Internet Protocol addresses and timing the frequency of reports received there.

Source: ZDNet

Comments

18 Aug 2004 ~ 3:10pm PirateNinja This reminds of when customers would call in at the old ISP I worked at. "I just got a brand new Dell, not 20 minutes ago. I connected to the internet, and now I get some sort of countdown and it just shuts down." They would be in tears sometimes. Poor bastards.
18 Aug 2004 ~ 9:21pm csimon SP2 ...wrap your stump before you hump!
18 Aug 2004 ~ 9:43pm Spinner

csimon wrote:

SP2 ...wrap your stump before you hump!