Microsoft releases VML fix for Windows 98

From: "Dan"


| Fantastic, I followed your instructions and saw the two colored boxes
| with Internet Explorer and it works fine. Good point about making the
| original vgx.dll to a vgx.bak file just in case it is needed in the
| future for some reason which I highly doubt. Thanks so much for going
| to the trouble of keeping 98SE machines secure. I now have a bunch of
| work in patching all the 98SE machines at school. grin P.S. I
| wonder when 2000 goes into unsupported mode as well if the XP and then
| Vista patches will be able to be deconstructed and broken down into
| pieces and used like this patch has been by us.

Sorry Dan but if you are STILL using Win98 in a school environment by the time Vista comes
out then the school is a fool !

--
Dave
http://www.claymania.com/removal-trojan-adware.html
http://www.ik-cs.com/got-a-virus.htm

David H. Lipman wrote:
Actually, it is.
Were you a victim?
Do you know anyone who was a victim?


I know victims. It is NOT irrelevant. This is a IE problem, not an
OS problem.
Microsoft has decided to cut-off support for Win9x/ME. However that
does NOT make Win9x/ME users less vulnerable. If one visits a VMFill
Exploit based web site, they can be infected in seconds and since
many of the sites are using NEW malware, their respective AV software
may not detect tghe malware. As of my last test, the most commonly
used freebies didn't recognize an HTML file known to use the VMFill
Exploit. Thus a Win98 user using AVG has a strong possibility of
being infected.

You get what you pay for.

Dan wrote:

http://news.softpedia.com/news/Micro...et-33363.shtml

The conclusions emitted are that Microsoft amassed a
global usage share of 96.97% with just three products.

The original source for the above stats are he

http://www.onestat.com/html/aboutus_...ket-share.html

"A global usage share of xx percent for OS Y means that xx
percent of the visitors of Internet users arrived at sites
that are using one of OneStat.com's services by using the
particular number of OS Y."

It's hard to know who Onestat's customers are. That could skew the
results towards corporate or institutional web surfers and away from
soho or home users.

I would really like to see Google's analysis of operating system
statistics based on the ID string submitted by web browers hitting
their search portals. Have they ever published this?

I didn't think that XP's share was much higher than 80%. It's listed
as 86% by the above survey. I think perhaps that it was 80% a year
ago, so perhaps the 86% is correct. Win-98 has been half of Win-2k
for at least several years now, but I thought it was slightly more
than 4%, with 2K at 8%.

----------

Sept 2002:

"Two interesting market surveys indicate that Windows has
actually gained market share in the most recent quarter,
even though PC sales have almost flattened and will likely
grow at an abbreviated rate through 2003. According to market
researcher OneStat.com, Windows now controls 97.46 percent
of the global desktop operating system market, compared to
just 1.43 percent for Apple Macintosh and 0.26 percent for
Linux. OneStat.com says its figures are derived from real-
time global Web site analysis, and are an average of the
past two months."

http://www.windowsitpro.com/Article/...6567.html?Ad=1

Note again that it was Onestat who performed that survey.

If you compare the recent survey, Macro$haft has 96.9% of the market
today, vs 97.46% in late 2002. That's a decline the way I read it.

Remember how some were poo-pooing the claims that Micro$lack was
extending support for Win-98 because of fears of people jumping ship
to Linux?

There's only one direction for Windoze market penetration - and that's
down, and that's what's been happening. If only at a glacial pace.

----------

Want to see some blasts from the past?

http://www.cnn.com/TECH/computing/98...ref=sitesearch

http://www.webshopper.com/article/id...1/article.html

http://www.cnn.com/TECH/computing/9810/29/win2000.idg/

From: "chrisv"



| You get what you pay for.

Well AntiVir does OK on the file I submitted.

AVG and Avast -- still don't get it !

I keep saying, of the freebies, AntiVir is better !

Not listed in the below Virus Total report is Trend Micro:
l00p.html.1 [EXPL_EXECOD.A]



Complete scanning result of "l00p.html.1", processed in VirusTotal at 09/28/2006 04:26:28
(CET).

[ file data ]
* name: l00p.html.1
* size: 86923
* md5.: 66ddd835cb6a6ab4d561c0cbd9c8450a
* sha1: 65c76f6b3a6853527ee60ee004234d43c2d3bcb4

[ scan result ]
AntiVir 7.2.0.18/20060927 found [HTML/Dldr.Go.MG.3.B]
Authentium 4.93.8/20060928 found [HTML/VMLFill@expl]
Avast 4.7.892.0/20060927 found nothing
AVG 386/20060927 found nothing
BitDefender 7.2/20060928 found [Exploit.HTML.Execod.A]
CAT-QuickHeal 8.00/20060927 found [CVE-2006-4868]
ClamAV devel-20060426/20060927 found nothing
DrWeb 4.33/20060927 found [Exploit.VMLFill]
eTrust-InoculateIT 23.73.7/20060928 found [JScript/Veemyfull!exploit!Trojan]
eTrust-Vet 30.3.3103/20060927 found [JS/Veemyfull!exploit]
Ewido 4.0/20060927 found [Not-A-Virus.Exploit.HTML.VML.d]
F-Prot 3.16f/20060928 found [HTML/VMLFill@expl]
F-Prot4 4.2.1.29/20060928 found [HTML/VMLFill@ex]
Fortinet 2.82.0.0/20060927 found [HTML/MS06.XMLNS!exploit]
Ikarus 0.2.65.0/20060928 found [Exploit.HTML.Execod.A]
Kaspersky 4.0.2.24/20060928 found [Exploit.HTML.VML.d]
McAfee 4861/20060927 found [Exploit-VMLFill]
Microsoft 1.1603/20060928 found [Exploit:HTML/Levem.C]
NOD32v2 1.1780/20060927 found [HTML/Exploit.VMLFill]
Norman 5.80.02/20060927 found [JS/VMLexploit]
Panda 9.0.0.4/20060927 found [Exploit/VML.A]
Sophos 4.10.0/20060928 found nothing
Symantec 8.0/20060928 found [Bloodhound.Exploit.78]
TheHacker 6.0.1.085/20060928 found [Trojan/Exploit.VML]
UNA 1.83/20060927 found nothing
VBA32 3.11.1/20060927 found nothing
VirusBuster 4.3.7:9/20060927 found [JS.ExpDL.A]



--
Dave
http://www.claymania.com/removal-trojan-adware.html
http://www.ik-cs.com/got-a-virus.htm

chrisv wrote:

Thus a Win98 user using AVG has a strong possibility of
being infected.

You get what you pay for.

Which means XP users back between 2002 to 2004 got screwed.

Win-98 was a much better bang-for-the-buck compared to XP.

Arguably it still is.

Wait until Microsoft owns your desktop with Vista, with it's orwellian
media rights management infrastructure.

From: "98 Guy"

| chrisv wrote:

Thus a Win98 user using AVG has a strong possibility of
being infected.

You get what you pay for.

| Which means XP users back between 2002 to 2004 got screwed.

| Win-98 was a much better bang-for-the-buck compared to XP.

| Arguably it still is.

| Wait until Microsoft owns your desktop with Vista, with it's orwellian
| media rights management infrastructure.

That is NOT true !

Win9x/ME is based upon a 16bit memory pool. It uses up that memory pool quite quickly.
You can add more physical RAM but it won't make a difference to that memory pool.

NT Based OS' have a completely different memory model. When you take inio account; NTFS,
permissions, memory pools, PNP, uPNP, etc, WinXP has greater bang fo the buck.

--
Dave
http://www.claymania.com/removal-trojan-adware.html
http://www.ik-cs.com/got-a-virus.htm

"David H. Lipman" wrote:

Sorry Dan but if you are STILL using Win98 in a school environment
by the time Vista comes out then the school is a fool !

No, the school is not a fool.

If the school did move to Vista, then the taxpayers would be fools.

Does electronic page-turning really need Vista? Or XP?

Do you really want to see school boards throwing out perfectly good
PC's and replace them with the Cray's that they'll need to run Vista?

David H. Lipman wrote:
From: "chrisv"



You get what you pay for.

Well AntiVir does OK on the file I submitted.

AVG and Avast -- still don't get it !

I keep saying, of the freebies, AntiVir is better !

Totally agree.

AVG has always been a bit of a joke... Avast swings from good to bad.

The list os scan results is a good reason I started using NOD32 years ago...
and it contributes to why I have never been infected in spite of attempts
made. Being careful and aware are still the best tools though.



Not listed in the below Virus Total report is Trend Micro:
l00p.html.1 [EXPL_EXECOD.A]



Complete scanning result of "l00p.html.1", processed in VirusTotal at
09/28/2006 04:26:28 (CET).

[ file data ]
* name: l00p.html.1
* size: 86923
* md5.: 66ddd835cb6a6ab4d561c0cbd9c8450a
* sha1: 65c76f6b3a6853527ee60ee004234d43c2d3bcb4

[ scan result ]
AntiVir 7.2.0.18/20060927 found [HTML/Dldr.Go.MG.3.B]
Authentium 4.93.8/20060928 found [HTML/VMLFill@expl]
Avast 4.7.892.0/20060927 found nothing
AVG 386/20060927 found nothing
BitDefender 7.2/20060928 found [Exploit.HTML.Execod.A]
CAT-QuickHeal 8.00/20060927 found [CVE-2006-4868]
ClamAV devel-20060426/20060927 found nothing
DrWeb 4.33/20060927 found [Exploit.VMLFill]
eTrust-InoculateIT 23.73.7/20060928 found
[JScript/Veemyfull!exploit!Trojan]
eTrust-Vet 30.3.3103/20060927 found [JS/Veemyfull!exploit]
Ewido 4.0/20060927 found [Not-A-Virus.Exploit.HTML.VML.d]
F-Prot 3.16f/20060928 found [HTML/VMLFill@expl]
F-Prot4 4.2.1.29/20060928 found [HTML/VMLFill@ex]
Fortinet 2.82.0.0/20060927 found [HTML/MS06.XMLNS!exploit]
Ikarus 0.2.65.0/20060928 found [Exploit.HTML.Execod.A]
Kaspersky 4.0.2.24/20060928 found [Exploit.HTML.VML.d]
McAfee 4861/20060927 found [Exploit-VMLFill]
Microsoft 1.1603/20060928 found [Exploit:HTML/Levem.C]
NOD32v2 1.1780/20060927 found [HTML/Exploit.VMLFill]
Norman 5.80.02/20060927 found [JS/VMLexploit]
Panda 9.0.0.4/20060927 found [Exploit/VML.A]
Sophos 4.10.0/20060928 found nothing
Symantec 8.0/20060928 found [Bloodhound.Exploit.78]
TheHacker 6.0.1.085/20060928 found [Trojan/Exploit.VML]
UNA 1.83/20060927 found nothing
VBA32 3.11.1/20060927 found nothing
VirusBuster 4.3.7:9/20060927 found [JS.ExpDL.A]

From: "98 Guy"

| "David H. Lipman" wrote:

Sorry Dan but if you are STILL using Win98 in a school environment
by the time Vista comes out then the school is a fool !

| No, the school is not a fool.

| If the school did move to Vista, then the taxpayers would be fools.

| Does electronic page-turning really need Vista? Or XP?

| Do you really want to see school boards throwing out perfectly good
| PC's and replace them with the Cray's that they'll need to run Vista?

You can defend this POV all you want but, Win98 is a DEAD OS and as time goes on, it will
be left behind, more and more.
Sorry, but you will have to face that fact.

--
Dave
http://www.claymania.com/removal-trojan-adware.html
http://www.ik-cs.com/got-a-virus.htm

"David H. Lipman" wrote:

Win9x/ME is based upon a 16bit memory pool. It uses up that
memory pool quite quickly.

Win 98 has 5 heaps (which collectively are called "resources"), only 2
of which are 16-bit, and none of them really impact or limit system
functionality. That wasn't necessarily true back when the typical
Win-98 user ran a lot of 16-bit apps, but interestingly as time went
on and users migrated to 32-bit apps these resource limitations
essentially went away.

You can add more physical RAM but it won't make a difference
to that memory pool.

I've been running and administering Win-98 systems since Win-98se both
at home and in a small corporate environment. I've transiently seen
systems showing "low resource" messages, but never on a continuous
basis, and rarely to the point where any system has become unusable.
And all that was pre-2002 - nothing since.

When you take inio account; NTFS,

And when NTFS crashes, you've got no tools to recover the disk.

permissions,

the bane of a small office or home use

memory pools,

?

PNP, uPNP, etc,

All available with 98.

You are, of course, aware of the security nightmare with uPNP - yes?

WinXP has greater bang for the buck.

XP has greater vulnerability-for-the buck.