Put the rose tinted glasses to one side. We still had harmful viruses back in the day, difference is these days you are storing more private information "online" so the effect of compromise is larger.

[–] ChaoticNeutralCzech@feddit.de 19 points 5 months ago

Back then, there were still lots of "wipers" that deleted files and/or destroyed the OS. Now it's all spyware and ransomware.

[–] KillingTimeItself@lemmy.dbzer0.com 9 points 5 months ago (1 children)

i'm mostly just sad that the funny side of malicious software is gone.

There's no more funny malware. It's all ransomware and stealers.

[–] lukecooperatus@lemmy.ml 3 points 5 months ago (1 children)

There's no more funny malware.

That depends who gets infected.

You or me infected by malware? No thanks!

Egon Mark infected by malware? Absolute hilarity!

[–] KillingTimeItself@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 points 5 months ago

i mean yeah, but that's only situationally funny.

[–] ssj2marx@lemmy.ml 6 points 5 months ago (1 children)

Yeah I haven't had harmful application on my computer in over a decade. I feel like you really have to go out of your way to get one these days (not including spyware that you download intentionally, like Windows 11).

[–] Sphks@lemmy.dbzer0.com 12 points 5 months ago (1 children)

The thing is, harmful apps are now difficult to detect compared to years ago. The hackers prefer to get the control of your device without ruining it.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Botnet

[–] Trainguyrom@reddthat.com 5 points 5 months ago

There's even extreme edgecases where a compromised machine being part of a botnet actually improves security because the malware shores up security to help itself remain persistent and not find itself removed/blocked by other malware or attackers

[–] ICastFist@programming.dev 2 points 5 months ago

Vandalism became theft and kidnapping