I wonder what are the low lifes actually protecting themselves from? Malware attacks in principle, or preparing to prevent a malware infection courtesy of an unamed law enforcement agency given their interest in coding malware :"German police officials have expressed interest in developing software tools to help them surveil computer users who may be involved in crime. The tools might include types of software similar to those used in online fraud and theft schemes, such as programs that record keystrokes, logins and passwords. Security companies, however, are asserting that they wouldn't make exceptions to their software to accommodate, for example, Trojan horse programs planted by law enforcement on users' computers."
This is a very contradictive development that deserves to be much more actively debated around the industry than it is for the time being. Law enforcement agensies and intelligence agencies have always been interested in zero day vulnerabilities and firmware infections, thus gaining a competitive advantage in the silent war. Among the most famous speculations of an intelligence agency using malicious code for offensive purposes is the infamous CIA infection/logicbomb of Russian gas pipeline :
"While there were no physical casualties from the pipeline explosion, there was significant damage to the Soviet economy. Its ultimate bankruptcy, not a bloody battle or nuclear exchange, is what brought the Cold War to an end. In time the Soviets came to understand that they had been stealing bogus technology, but now what were they to do? By implication, every cell of the Soviet leviathan might be infected. They had no way of knowing which equipment was sound, which was bogus. All was suspect, which was the intended endgame for the operation. The faulty software was slipped to the Russians after an agent recruited by the French and dubbed "Farewell" provided a shopping list of Soviet priorities, which focused on stealing Western technology."
Excluding the spy thriller motives, nothing's impossible the impossible just takes a little while, and the same goes for SCADA devices vulnerabilities and on purposely shipping buggy software. Anti virus vendors will get even more pressure trying to protect their customers from not only the malware released by malware authors, but also from the one courtesy of law enforcement agencies. Cyber warfare is here to stay, no doubt about it, but using malware to monitor suspects will perhaps prompt them to keep an eye on the last time their AV software got updated, and still keep pushing the update button in between.
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