Haxxed laptop with Vista attack code removed from Ebay
By Triston McIntyre
Ok, ok, we can all laugh and joke about some of the rather humorous ends eBay has gone to in the interest of protecting its customers, but there’s a real chance that the latest caper moves from lighthearted humor to rather arguable controversy. Ebay has removed a laptop that contains an attack code used to crack Vista in the interesting of its buyers’ “safety.”
A recent contest was held by members of the hacking community called “PWN 2 OWN,” in which teams and individuals developed code designed to exploit flaws in the various operating systems on the market. Vista was an obvious target, because of its popularity (note, I use that word almost interchangeably with notoriety) and Window’s known affinity for being easy hacked.
Needless to say, hacker Shane Macaulay was the fellow to successfully break Vista’s code, and as an act of service to the rest of the software and hacking community, listed the laptop he used, with the attack code still included, on eBay.
According to InfoWorld, eBay’s site monitors were worried by the terminology used in the listing, and felt that the contents of the computer could be dangerous to its buyer.
Macaulay, who works for the Security Objectives consultancy, would have been in breach of his contract with his employer, and had the laptop been sold successfully, wouldn’t have been able to continue with his work there.
However, it strikes me as suspicious that a laptop which was, for all intensive purposes, listed simply as tool for those who could just as easily have found a fix for Macaulay’s breach, was removed by eBay in the interest of its buyers. Obviously, eBay can do whatever it wants with its site, but this seems to be a stance on how eBay feels about the software hacking community.
In my opinion, it is a shame that an exploit like this can’t serve as evidence of a way in which some resourceful programmers are helping improve the security of rather flawed platforms such as Vista. Though the hacking will undoubtedly continue, I doubt we’ll be seeing many hacked laptops making their ways through the pearly gates of eBay anytime soon.
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