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Old March 3rd 12, 09:30 PM posted to microsoft.public.win98.gen_discussion
Lostgallifreyan
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Default How to gain access to websites that require latest Java installed

98 Guy wrote in :

Even back in the prime-time for Win-98, there wasn't much that
could touch it.


much? Or anything at all?


No network worms could touch win-98.


But could they have? I remember that Nimda and Code Red were maybe the first
big 'worm' craze. They hit W2K and WXP but not W98. They could infetc W98,
I think, but not do much with the infection, but I can't remember details of
why.

But that likely has more to do with worms still being new to most people (as
opposed to viruses which were older news). I think it had more to do with the
surge of unwary users getting online, rather than the technical details of
the OS's they chose. The coders will have aimed at the OS they were most
likely to use into the near future. Microsoft at that time were talking about
merging the home and business OS's into one based on WNT and W2K, so that,
rather than anything W98 specific, likely explains the targetting for the new
form of net-based attack called worms. Until that time, most attacks were
based on the machine under attack, and its contents. Later, the scope was for
harnessing its power on the net (remote controlled email spamming and
scamming, DDoS attacking, bot-nets, etc). All those abuses need many similar
machines, and as W98 was losing users fast, there was no point in aiming at
W98. But if they had, I'm sure it would have rolled over easily enough if
used as supplied, by those same unwary users.