Hacker To Release Norton Antivirus Source Code Coming Tuesday (17 Jan 2012)

Refer to 'Enterprise IT News'

Refer to Hackers Claim To Compromise Symantec Norton Antivirus

The latest updates from Reuters which acknowledges a claim whereby a hacker who goes by the name of 'Yama Tough', has threatened to release full source code for Symantec Corp's Norton Antivirus on coming Tuesday (17 Jan 2012), New Delhi's time.

Let's all of us just see what is going to happen and what Symantec is going to do about it.

Symantec apparently tracked down such claim by means of monitoring the twitter accounts of known hackers; in this case it is Yama Tough.

Based on the twitter feeds, I came to realized that Symantec has been waging cyber war with this group of hackers and has apparently paralyzes their cyber activities. As a result, the hackers are performing counter-strike.

It was all started by a lawsuit of a man against Symantec who sued the latter based on the claim that Symantec has, by means of business strategy, create scenarios which convinces consumers that their PC are vulnerable to certain security loopholes. Refer here.

Symantec stood that such claim is without merit.

By having access to source codes, the community will be able to review certain secrets of the operation of Norton Antivirus and the core architecture behind it. This may lead to clues on scale of complexity of cyber security in today's business.

From a software development point of view, it is possible to tell the source of vulnerabilities (such as computer virus infections) as detected by NAV. It is also highly possible to find out how NAV discovers such treats in advance and how it deals with them. All these will lead to clues on the business of Symantec NAV.

My personal thoughts are:
  • Hackers' claim of possession of source codes is not real.
  • Hackers have the source codes and do not have enough time and intelligence to unlock such information to help with their cause.
  • Hackers are just trying their luck to win community support to support their cause.

Either way, we will find out what's happening on coming Tuesday.

Nevertheless, on the ground of software development and business, such possession of Symantec NAV is illegal.

Stay tuned!

Comments