this post was submitted on 19 Jul 2024
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This isn't a gloat post. In fact, I was completely oblivious to this massive outage until I tried to check my bank balance and it wouldn't log in.

Apparently Visa Paywave, banks, some TV networks, EFTPOS, etc. have gone down. Flights have had to be cancelled as some airlines systems have also gone down. Gas stations and public transport systems inoperable. As well as numerous Windows systems and Microsoft services affected. (At least according to one of my local MSMs.)

Seems insane to me that one company's messed up update could cause so much global disruption and so many systems gone down :/ This is exactly why centralisation of services and large corporations gobbling up smaller companies and becoming behemoth services is so dangerous.

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[–] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago

Is there an easy way to silence every fuckdamn sanctimonious linux cultist from my lemmy experience?

Secondly, this update fucked linux just as bad as windows, but keep huffing your own farts. You seem to like it.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

I love how everyone understands the issue wrong. It's not about being on Windows or Linux. It's about the ecosystem that is common place and people are used to on Windows or Linux. On windows it's accepted that every stupid anticheat can drop its filthy paws into ring 0 and normies don't mind. Linux has a fostered a less clueless community, but ultimately it's a reminder to keep vigilant and strive for pure and well documented open source with the correct permissions.

BSODs won't come from userspace software

[–] [email protected] 0 points 8 months ago (2 children)

While I don’t totally disagree with you, this has mostly nothing to do with Windows and everything to do with a piece of corporate spyware garbage that some IT Manager decided to install. If tools like that existed for Linux, doing what they do to to the OS, trust me, we would be seeing kernel panics as well.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Hate to break it to you, but CrowdStrike falcon is used on Linux too...

[–] [email protected] 0 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (2 children)

And if it was a kernel-level driver that failed, Linux machines would fail to boot too. The amount of people seeing this and saying “MS Bad,” (which is true, but has nothing to do with this) instead of “how does an 83 billion dollar IT security firm push an update this fucked” is hilarious

[–] [email protected] 0 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Falcon uses eBPF on Linux nowadays. It's still an irritating piece of software, but it no make your boxen fail to boot.

edit: well, this is a bad take. I should avoid commenting on shit when I'm sleep deprived and filled with meeting dread.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

You're asking the wrong question: why does a security nightmare need a 90 billion dollar company to unfuck it?

[–] [email protected] 0 points 8 months ago (1 children)

What’s your solution to cyberattacks?

[–] [email protected] -1 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

Linux in the hands of professionals. There's a reason IIS isn't used anymore.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

How is it not a window problem?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

The fault seems to be 90/10 CS, MS.

MS allegedly pushed a bad update. Ok, it happens. Crowdstrike's initial statement seems to be blaming that.

CS software csagent.sys took exception to this and royally shit the bed, disabling the entire computer. I don't think it should EVER do that, so the weight of blame must lie with them.

The really problematic part is, of course, the need to manually remediate these machines. I've just spent the morning of my day off doing just that. Thanks, Crowdstrike.

EDIT: Turns out it was 100% Crowdstrike, and the update was theirs. The initial press release from CS seemed to be blaming Microsoft for an update, but that now looks to be misleading.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 8 months ago (1 children)

It's proving that POSIX architecture is necessary even if it requires additional computer literacy on the part of users and admins.

The risk of hacking (which is what Crowdstrike essentially does to get so deeply embedded and be so effective at endpoint protection) a monolithic system like Windows OS is if you screw up the whole thing comes tumbling down.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (1 children)

Crowdstrike already killed some Linux machines. Let's not pretend Windows is at fault here or Linux is magically better in this area. No one is immune from software that can run as a kernel module going bad.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (1 children)

Every system has its faults. And I'm still going to dogpile the system with the most faults. But hell Microsoft did buy GitHub, Halo, MineCraft, and a million other things they will probably find a way to buy Linux and ruin it for us just like they ruin everything else.

Let's see, ...we are somewhere in between Extend and Extinguish on the roadmap.

Edit: Case & Point, RIP RedHat & IBM and GitHub CoPilot, what a great idea. RIP Atom Editor and probably a million other things. Do we have a KilledByMicrosoft website yet? I hope people in the pharmacy could get their prescriptions or we might have to add peoples names to the list.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Also fyi Red Hat and IBM are still around and aren't really a force for good anyway. Stop SIMPing for large companies.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 8 months ago

Hilarious. I am sure that, out of principle, you have stopped using all the software that Red Hat contributes to your distribution.

If it is ok with you, I am not going to define my morality in terms of corporate interest. They are not my friends but I do not believe that shutting on their contributions does much for me either.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (1 children)

Didn't Crowdstrike have a bad update to Debian systems back in April this year that caused a lot of problems? I don't think it was a big thing since not as many companies are using Crowdstrike on Debian.

Sounds like the issue here is Crowdstrike and not Windows.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago

*crowdstrike

[–] [email protected] 0 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (1 children)

I isn't even a Linux vs Windows thing but a competent at your job vs don't know what the fuck you are doing thing. Critical systems are immutable and isolated or as close as reasonably possible. They don't do live updates of third party software and certainly not software that is running privileged and can crash the operating system.

I couldn't face working in corporate IT with this sort of bullshit going on.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (1 children)

It's also a "don't allow third party proprietary shit into your kernel" issue. If the driver was open source it would actually go through a public code review and the issue would be more likely to get caught. Even if it did slip through people would publically have a fix by now with all the eyes on the code. It also wouldn't get pushed to everyone simultaneously under the control of a single company, it would get tested and packaged by distributions before making it to end users.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 8 months ago (1 children)

It's actually a "test things first and have a proper change control process" thing. Doesn't matter if it's open source, closed source scummy bullshit or even coded by God: you always test it first before hitting deploy.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

Microsoft should test all its products on its own computers, not on ours. Made an update, tested it and only then posted it online.