This past week it was reported [I even did a quickie article] on the great exploits in which the winner was Linux after Mac and Vista were hacked. But than I just read an article at CSO which described an Ebay sale which involved an alleged laptop with Vista attack code. Ebay pulled the sale saying it could damage other computers. Than it was learned that the seller was the winner of the security hack attack that involved the Vista system. But what I find strange is the fact that was it Vista that was attacked OR Abobe Flash Player that was exploited?

In reading some of the original reports, it wasn’t until Adobe Flash Player was installed could Vista be exploited. It was also noted that Adobe was in the process of patching the flaw that the hackers used. Even in the CSO article it was noted:

Though the laptop he hacked runs Vista, Macaulay claimed that his Adobe Flash Player exploit will affect 90 percent of computers worldwide. He won a $5,000 cash prize, courtesy of 3Com’s TippingPoint division, and the Fujitsu U810 laptop he had hacked into for his work.

Had Macaulay been able to sell his laptop before Adobe patched the issue, he would have violated his contract with TippingPoint, said Terri Forslof, the company’s manager of security response. “We would have disqualified him from the program,” she said.

The laptop had not been hit with any other attack code during the course of the contest, she added. “He was the only person who tried,” she said.

So am I misunderstanding the hack itself? Wasn’t it Adobe Flash Player on a Vista system that was attacked?Not Vista itself? Or are the two interrelated?

Comments welcome.

Complete article is here.

Tags: ebay, laptop, sale, exploit, vista, adobe, exploit, hacked