Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!usc!jarthur!wilkins
From: wilkins@jarthur.Claremont.EDU (Mark Wilkins)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac.misc
Subject: Re: A modest proposal...
Message-ID: <9720@jarthur.Claremont.EDU>
Date: 20 Nov 90 18:49:18 GMT
References: <1990Nov19.033747.29163@ux1.cso.uiuc.edu> <27013.27483646@kuhub.cc.ukans.edu> <1990Nov20.171542.8779@cunixf.cc.columbia.edu>
Organization: Harvey Mudd College, Claremont, CA 91711
Lines: 26

In article <1990Nov20.171542.8779@cunixf.cc.columbia.edu> wln@cunixb.cc.columbia.edu (William L Nussbaum) writes:
>- You have no control over the extent of this virus.
>- You have no control over future modification of this virus.
>- You introduce another variable into problems people may have.
>- You cannot repair viruses with it.
>- Given that it's copying itself over and over, there are a number of
>   opportunities for corruption.


  What if it gives the user an opportunity to refuse?  Throws up an
informational dialog and lets the user choose whether to install it?
Provides a means by which to remove it if it causes trouble?

  I think that if people were aware of such a thing it might not be so bad,
as long as they were given the chance to refuse infection by such an
anti-virus virus.

  I'm not necessarily posing this question seriously, but do you think this
might lighten some of the ethical difficulty?

-- Mark Wilkins
-- 
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