InternetMalware How-to's Part of Computer Science Class

To make a point about the lack of education in computer security, a university professor offers courses in writing malware. Antivirus vendors don't buy the logic.

It's not easy to reach Sonoma State University Professor George Ledin these days. Thanks to a Newsweek article profiling his computer science classes with an emphasis on the creation of malware like Trojan horses and keyloggers, a lot of people want to talk to him. And a lot of people are mad at him. Despite the predictable indignation and outrage by the antivirus vendors, whose software Ledin is showing future graduates how to circumvent, Ledin insists he is not creating future Slammer and Sasser authors out in the woods of northern California, just south of the city of Santa Rosa. "The virus writers don't need me, they are not going to take my course," he told InternetNews.com. "I want to teach a generation of experts and technologists to be ethical and be aware and be knowledgeable and contribute something to it." Ledin insists that he is also teaching best practices in his class on writing good code, code that is not vulnerable to attack. Not surprisingly, the antivirus vendors aren't having it. "You don't have to write a virus to understand them and how to detect them," said Randy Abrams, director of technical education with ESET Software. "The time spent to write a virus is worthless. Any student at a college beyond the first few courses who can't write a virus probably shouldn't be there because it's not a difficult algorithm to write." Joe Telafici, vice president of Avert operations at McAfee, is also skeptical. "Whether this class is helping... [ Read more on www.internetnews.com ]

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