Thursday, August 11, 2005

Microsoft's HoneyMonkeys - On The Lookout For Bad URL's

Interesting TechnologyReview piece by Simon Garfinkel about Microsoft computers scanning the internet in search of websites capable of exploiting flaws in Internet Explorer.

A few snips from the original article in Information Week

"In the first month, the honeymonkeys found 752 unique URLs operated by 287 Web sites that can successfully deliver exploit code against unpatched Windows XP PCs.

An unpatched XP SP1 PC, for instance, would be vulnerable to 688 URLs and 270 sites, 91 and 94 percent, respectively, of all those uncovered by the honeymonkeys. But update to SP2, and those numbers fall to 204 and 115 (27 and 43 percent). Better yet, a partially-patched SP box -- one updated to those fixes released through early 2005 -- is vulnerable to only 17 malicious URLs and 10 sites (2 and 3 percent of all those found).

During the initial run of the project, the honeymonkeys demonstrated the value of keeping Windows XP up to date, said Toulouse. "One thing I'd stress out of this is the importance of keeping software up to date."