I absolutely love Christmas, and even have a soft spot for a lot of the tacky stuff that comes with it, like fake silver trees, loud-colored garland and the Coca-Cola version of Santa Claus.
But there is one thing that will bring out the Grinch in me every time — holiday-inspired PR pitches security vendors insist on hurling at me with the glee of kids in a snowball fight. The folks at PGP will probably be mad at me for this, but I can’t help but make an example of them this time around.
Here’s what they sent me Tuesday as I sat anxiously awaiting this month’s Microsoft patch bulletins:
The 12 Threats of Christmas
The twelve threats of Christmas, is networking secure?
The bad guys are shaking their lures.
With the Storm Worm, and rootkits, and crimeware everywhere, We should prepare For infections we’d rather not share!
O the twelve threats of Christmas, what more can we endure?
Twelve hackers hacking
Eleven passwords cracking
Ten laptops leaving
Nine phishers phishing
Eight Web sites crashing
Seven spammers spamming
Six Trojans sneaking
Five breaches more!
Four corp’rate spies
Three bot nets
Two online games
And an unencrypted missing flash drive!
The only gift I can give in return is a groan followed by a Bah Humbug!
