FunWebProducts

[w3bmastine]

I had a single visit from 'FunWebProducts' today, requesting a non-existing page. Interestingly the request came from an Ukrainian mobile phone provider (Kyivstar GSM).

The referrer offers credit card numbers but databases do not contain any data that suggests why the visit.

log snippet (added a white space to unlink the referrer):

134.249.54.*** - - [21/Jun/2016:08:52:25 +0200] "GET /contact/ HTTP/1.1" 404 1134 "https:// example.com" "Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 6.0; Windows NT 5.1; SV1; FunWebProducts; .NET CLR 1.1.4322; PeoplePal 6.2)" "example.com"

What do you make of this? Ref-spam?

[edited by: keyplyr at 9:24 pm (utc) on Jun 21, 2016]
[edit reason] exemplified link [/edit]

[keyplyr]

FunWebProducts has long been considered a malware add-on but it sometimes is a UA attribute of unsuspecting humans.

Your visitor could be legit or the UA could be spoofed. You'll need to look at other indicators like IP address, behavior & header. If the behavior isn't malicious, I would just ignore it.

But just a FYI - refer spam is one tactic to get you to visit the link and possibly infect your own browser, so take that into consideration before you *investigate* these links.

[webmasterworld.com...]

[dstiles]

Also, the hit came from an XP machine usine MSIE6. The browser has long been considered dangerous and obsolete and I've blocked it for at least a couple of years.

As of several months ago I also reject XP, displaying a suitable message. Some here may consider that bad policy but XP has been obsolete for a long time now.

[wilderness]

XP has been obsolete for a long time now

I've three machines with XP (none others), and when it stops working, I'm done! Kaput! Goodbye! So long!

[keyplyr]

Another one bites the dust :(

"Here lies Wilderness... he had no more security updates left"

[blend27]

Nothing wrong with XP as an OS, I also run 3 of them in VM strictly for WEB-DEV purposes with only 750mb of Ram needed for each. FF runs just fine on XP.

re: https:// example.com

On the other hand, one client had purchased a cheap SSL Certificate where IE6,7 and even 8(or other obsolete browsers) would not be able to connect to a site - the request never makes it to Application. So much easier to block the bots on that site!

[wilderness]

"Here lies Wilderness... he had no more security updates left"

keyplr,
Except for the monthly thingy for malware (which is useless) there haven't been any updates available for XP-32 for at least five years (likely longer).

I've a machine that is XP-64 and updates were coming regularly until last year. I had this machine made for a project a few years ago. There were a couple of glitches and I found documentation that advised using WIN 7 updates for some specific things.
I may use the machine again, however it's currently boxed and sealed.

Haven't used my laptop (XP-32) for more than 18 months.

The real issue is hardware related and specific to my widgets work. I'm limited to the SP-2 update and many software's (including AV) require SP-3.

[keyplyr]

"Nothing wrong with XP as an OS"

Well not to take the discussion further off topic, but according to Microsoft (who stopped supporting security on XP years ago) what is wrong is these vulnerable machines contribute to the propagation of viruses and botnets worldwide since there is little to protect them against modern infection methods.

One of the key reasons why MS gave free upgrades to Windows10 was to help get rid of XP and other archaic OS and help make the internet safer.

[blend27]

OT: and One other key reason why MS gave free upgrades to Windows10 was to get everyone into a cloud.

And I hear your point. The most important skill when using a Grass Raik is not to step on the wrong end, in a dark ;)

But as I mentioned before I use XP VMs for WEB-DEV, light foot print, some have no access to internet, all use REVERT system option before VM shuts down, all behind hardware firewall, all are residing on latest MS Surface Pro with 16gb of Ram. We use SELENIUM IDE plugin for FF for testing of internal web apps, very convenient.

[lucy24]

what is wrong is these vulnerable machines contribute to the propagation of viruses and botnets worldwide

But that's not an intrinsic shortcoming in the OS; it's a decision made by the vendor. An OS upgrade is never a pure positive; there are always some losses. (On the Mac side, moving to OS 10.4, 10.6 and most recently 10.9 each meant giving up some valued features.)

If your old machine isn't Internet-connected at all (physically unplug the Ethernet cable and disable any WiFi software), there's not a heck of a lot of risk.

[keyplyr]

"One other key reason... was to get everyone into a cloud."

Hey, I've been in a cloud for years, ask anybody!

[dstiles]

My advice to customers is: if you NEED XP then run it, but never let it go online. That's when the danger arises.

> not an intrinsic shortcoming in the OS;

Sorry, Lucy, but it is. Even when patched, XP was the biggest virus vector available; now it's no longer patched, it can be lethal.