Thread: Order of Operations Question

Originally Posted by major_small

um, no... say I write program and name it 'Pause.exe'. then I put it in the win32 folder on YOUR computer while you're not watching... then you run you program and it calls 'pause'. your program can't tell the difference, so it runs the only pause.exe in the folder. your program runs mine which then connects to the internet and sends me every keystroke you type for the next month...

Well, if you first got to replace pause.exe with your spyware installer, you could just as well put it in the Startup folder.
Besides, with the amount of batch files I've written for various purposes, 'pause' would probably be executed anyway.

Just because there's two ways to do damage doesn't mean you should avoid blocking the first one.

You make a good point, but I think batch files are a different story. Batch files are either written for personal convenience, or distributed with the OS, eg. AUTOEXEC. With C++, it's much more common for programs to be transferred all over the place. I don't know if that explains it very well, but hopefully you see what I'm trying to say.

There's a hundred and one ways to install something on someone's computer once you got access to place a script or executable anywhere.
And to be quite frank, Replacing Pause.exe is right down there, just a step above Writing To A Floppy While You're Not Looking And Hoping You Forget To Take It Out Before You Reboot™.

And if you were to eliminate all 101 possibilities, what would you need firewalls for then? Or rather, what would you need your computer for then?

Do you mean to tell me you think using system() is a GOOD idea?

Originally Posted by sean_mackrory

Do you mean to tell me you think using system() is a GOOD idea?

No. It's not very portable.