[Serevinus]

If you have found a bug, want to request a feature, need help, or have any comments about my Viral Threat Level extension, please post in this thread
Before asking for help, make sure you have the latest version of the extension installed

[markh]

Hi,

I have downloaded your extension and saw that it didn't have a locale structure, so I have added locale support to it (and the Dutch locale as this is my native language). You can find the modified file attached.

If you are interested in getting more locales, feel free to submit it to BabelZilla. It is a website community dedicated to providing translations (for free) for Mozilla family extensions, and currently does so for almost 400 extensions already. I am part of the admin team there, so feel free to look around and ask me any question. My nick there is the same as the one I used on this board

This post has been edited by Serevinus: 13 July 2008 - 08:42 PM
Reason for edit:: Attachment link removed as the file seems to have gone AWOL

[Sub0]

Hi,

I really appreciate your add-on and wanted to make a couple of suggestions.

One is to include other sites which monitor internet threat activity such as http://isc.sans.org/. Perhaps the Firefox display could be the highest level of the sites or maybe a combination of them.

Second is to include some sort of sound when the level changes. Perhaps something snappy like Star Trek's Enterprise alert warning or maybe even make it configurable with local sound files per level. I believe this would boost your add-on coolness level. :-)

And third, include some sort of icon portraying the threat level. I find the bland rectangle bar with changing colors to be rather dull.

[Serevinus]

Sub0, on Dec 10 2007, 01:27 PM, said:

Hi,

I really appreciate your add-on and wanted to make a couple of suggestions.

One is to include other sites which monitor internet threat activity such as http://isc.sans.org/. Perhaps the Firefox display could be the highest level of the sites or maybe a combination of them.

Second is to include some sort of sound when the level changes. Perhaps something snappy like Star Trek's Enterprise alert warning or maybe even make it configurable with local sound files per level. I believe this would boost your add-on coolness level. :-)

And third, include some sort of icon portraying the threat level. I find the bland rectangle bar with changing colors to be rather dull.

Thanks

1. This seems simple enough in theory, I will see what I can do.
2. I'm not sure I know how to add sounds, as I am no expert at making extensions, but I will look into it.
3. This is simple enough, although given the height of the bar it would have to be a fairly small picture, if you are any good at making buttons, maybe you could post some samples, if they get used you would be given credit.

Out of interest, how do you use the extension? for example:-
How often do you look at it?
Do you ever use the "update viral threat status" menu item?
Do you ever use the "Go to Symantec Viral Threat Level Homepage" menu item? and if so, when?

[Sub0]

Serevinus, on Dec 10 2007, 01:06 PM, said:

3. This is simple enough, although given the height of the bar it would have to be a fairly small picture, if you are any good at making buttons, maybe you could post some samples, if they get used you would be given credit.

It doesn't have to be uber-fancy just something with some style to it. And you're right, the space is too small for icons and drawings. Maybe a bar with the complete threat scale (with smooth gradient colors from green to red) with a marker on the current level. You could stretch it wider to give some room for a nice coloring transition and the text you could keep it on the tooltip (or have the text equivalent inside the text box when clicking on the bar). This second approach has the added benefit of instantly giving a sense of 0%-100% whereas a simple orange will make me go searching for a legend...

Quote

Out of interest, how do you use the extension? for example:-
How often do you look at it?
Do you ever use the "update viral threat status" menu item?
Do you ever use the "Go to Symantec Viral Threat Level Homepage" menu item? and if so, when?

1. Typically when I start Firefox I will always take a look. And then it's just random but occasionally while I'm surfing.
2. No, I don't force updates. I expect your thingy to do that periodically for me. Aren't updates supposed to be automatic? Oh dear... In fact, when an update is done you could have it blink a couple of times just so I'm aware of it.
3. Yes, once to see what it contained. Since the threat scale is self-explanatory enough I seldom use it. I DID notice it contained some rather useful information. For example, right now it says

Quote

On December 8, 2007, three exploits affecting Windows Media Player, Winamp, and Windows Media Player Classic were released.

If you could somehow bring this information into the text box it would be rather nice. But I don't know if every piece of info Symantec releases is this interesting.

Glad you are responsive!

[Serevinus]

Sub0, on Dec 10 2007, 05:51 PM, said:

It doesn't have to be uber-fancy just something with some style to it. And you're right, the space is too small for icons and drawings. Maybe a bar with the complete threat scale (with smooth gradient colors from green to red) with a marker on the current level. You could stretch it wider to give some room for a nice coloring transition and the text you could keep it on the tooltip (or have the text equivalent inside the text box when clicking on the bar). This second approach has the added benefit of instantly giving a sense of 0%-100% whereas a simple orange will make me go searching for a legend...

I will have a fiddle with it and see what I come up with, I will probably add an option as to whether you want the old or new display.

Sub0, on Dec 10 2007, 05:51 PM, said:

2. No, I don't force updates. I expect your thingy to do that periodically for me. Aren't updates supposed to be automatic? Oh dear... In fact, when an update is done you could have it blink a couple of times just so I'm aware of it.

It currently updates every 15 minutes, the force update option is there just in case the request times out and you are stuck on the "offline" image for the next 15 minutes. Not sure how you make something blink, maybe I could add a new image that displays while it updating.

Sub0, on Dec 10 2007, 05:51 PM, said:

3. Yes, once to see what it contained. Since the threat scale is self-explanatory enough I seldom use it. I DID notice it contained some rather useful information. If you could somehow bring this information into the text box it would be rather nice. But I don't know if every piece of info Symantec releases is this interesting.

It does quite often tell you when there is a critical security update available for common operating systems, might be useful for those people that have automatic updates disabled.
Unfortunately the Symantec webpage has very simple HTML, which makes it difficult to use regular expressions to get what you want, I will try, but dont get your hopes up.

I am currently designing a website for a client, so it might be a week or two before I get to work on the update.

[Sub0]

Quote

It currently updates every 15 minutes, the force update option is there just in case the request times out and you are stuck on the "offline" image for the next 15 minutes. Not sure how you make something blink, maybe I could add a new image that displays while it updating.

15 minutes is perfect. I hadn't encountered the offline message so I didn't see the reason to use it. Yesterday though, the threat level changed for the first time to "Elevated" and I clicked to see what was going on. Sure enough it was to reflect the release of security updates for MS. That's really how I would use it; whenever the level changes, click to see what's going on.

Quote

It does quite often tell you when there is a critical security update available for common operating systems, might be useful for those people that have automatic updates disabled.
Unfortunately the Symantec webpage has very simple HTML, which makes it difficult to use regular expressions to get what you want, I will try, but dont get your hopes up.

I've been thinking about how your app could add value to systems and enhance the management of security threats.

Between the time where a vulnerability is discovered to the time where a patch is released users must avoid or workaround security holes. The problem is that security holes are popping up too frequently and it's very hard to keep up. Some people don't even know where to look to keep informed. That's where I see your app coming in. Providing that information when it is released so that users can create awareness and take necessary precautions.

Yesterday was a perfect example. Seeing how the threat level had changed I checked to see what was happening and saw that new security patches were available for Windows. Instead of waiting for the automatic update to kick in (which sometimes can take a couple of weeks...) I immediately patched my system. Here's another example. When out of curiosity I clicked on the threat icon (it was green) it gave that information about vulnerabilities in multimedia players. While a patch is not available this made me cautious about multimedia content I play on websites in general. I even restricted the automatic loading of web multimedia content and searched for a player which was not vulnerable.

The key to your app is INFORMATION. Actionable information that is. The more you can bring into it, the more value it will have. And if you allow me to expand on that idea here's what I think it could include. Besides the threat level (which is really limited to global worms, not something very usual) it could include advisory information. There are several independent sites that track vulnerabilities and publish them periodically. I'm sure they even make those advisories available through RSS feeds which is a handy way of keeping up to date in a summarized way. If you could somehow aggregate that information and display it in an informative and appealing way, that is really adding value to your application.

I hope I'm not overwhelming you with ideas. I realize this is something you're doing for free in your spare time. It's that I see so much potential for your adorable add-on that I am very enthusiastic about it.

Quote

I am currently designing a website for a client, so it might be a week or two before I get to work on the update.

No problem. Feel free to share your thoughts on the ideas I've presented, I confess that I haven't thought through it entirely. If it's too much for your undertaking or not your idea of a project I'll understand.

[Sub0]

Here are some screenshots I ripped off the Resident Evil:Extinction site of how I see the displaying of information. It's really for inspiration purposes.

As a background?




I really like how the globe spins on this one...






The threat level?


This is how the Internet Storm Center displays it's information (very dull and unappealing). If you could reformat it to fit the above visuals it would be awesome! And coupled with the advisory feeds => killer app!!



Ok, I'm getting carried away... I'm going to shut up now...

This post has been edited by Sub0: 12 December 2007 - 02:40 PM

[Serevinus]

Just tried to log into the MDC (Mozilla Developer Center) so I could play around with the extension, but I cant remember what username I used, and you cant retrieve the password unless you know the username. Looks like I am going to have to try emailing them.

Hope you have a merry Christmas

[Sub0]

Sorry for the late reply, hope you had a merry Xmas and a nice passage to 2008!

I found a new site that also posts a threat level.

http://www.virusradar.com/

It's from NOD32, one of the top anti-virus software companies.

Edit: Actually the threat level meter is on their homepage http://www.eset.com/. But the virusradar site posts much more additional info.

This post has been edited by Sub0: 09 January 2008 - 12:01 AM

[Hokie2]

It appears that this Add-On no longer works or Symantec has discontinued service, nothing loads on the Symantec page from the link in the Add-On, nor does the Task Bar indicator function anymore.

Make it a great day!

[Serevinus]

Sorry about the late reply.

It seems that Symantec changed the wording so my extension couldn't identify the current status... It also looks like they have recently blocked the extension from accessing the site completely, so I have had to change to McAfee instead.
I have also updated it to work with Firefox 3, added some links with more security information to the menu, and change the graphics.

I have submitted the new version to Mozilla for testing, but in the meantime, if you want to use the new version (shouldn't cause any problems, but until it has been tested I cannot be sure), you can download it from the VTL page on this site. The new version has been approved and can be downloaded from this site and from the official Mozilla extensions site
If you download this the new version I would love to receive feedback.

I will probably release a new version soon with more features.

Changes planned:
1. Fetch the status to a database on this site, and then set VTL to get the status from here rather than from McAfee (or Symantec), this will stop all the hundreds of requests to those websites, which given the number of VTL users is a fairly significant chunk of their bandwidth... Complete
You don't really need to read this bit unless you are interested in statistics...
The web page that supplies the data I use is 36KB, so if someone leaves their browser open 24 hours a day, the extension will be requesting about 3.4MB of data per day... Now, this extension has been downloaded 31,161 times, so lets say that only 5% of them use this extension regularly, that is roughly 5GB of bandwidth per day... looking at it that way, I think you may understand why Symantec decided to block it.
After my change this will go down to about 3.4MB per day regardless of the number of users, since my server will be handling the full load instead. I will trim the content so that only the data that is required by the extension will be supplied, so the load on my server will be roughly 50KB per person per day, for that 5% will be 76MB per day (just for the updates).

2. Aggregate threat information from multiple websites and set the VTL status to the highest average level (as suggested by Sub0). Complete

3. Add a new menu item that will open a web page on this web site, which will show as much detail about any current threats as I can collect. (variation on a feature suggested by Sub0) Postponed

4. I will add a link to the VTL homepage and the support forum. Complete

5. Add locale information to the extension using BabelZilla (as suggested by markh). Implemented, but a work in progress

6. Once changes 1-4 and the en-US locale have been added to the extension, I will update the version to 1.0, although there might be an intermediate version 0.3, it depends how well the changes work There is now a version 0.3 ready for testing, you can download it from the VTL homepage, or wait for it to be accepted on the Mozilla Firefox Add-ons site.

This post has been edited by Serevinus: 21 September 2008 - 03:46 AM
Reason for edit:: Modified the post (red bits are old, green bits new)

[Serevinus]

Version 0.3 is now released, you can download it from the VTL homepage, or wait for it to be accepted on the Mozilla Firefox Add-ons site.

Changes:
Threat data is now collected from 3 different security sites, and the score averaged
Localised the data to reduce the load on security sites used for data aggregation
Links have been added to the VTL homepage and support forum
Icons and breaks have been added to the menu
Added locale information, English (en-US) is complete, and Dutch (nl-NL) is 90% complete

See the post above for more information about the changes.

[arbystrider]

Try the threat level at AVG. Maybe even Sophos and Kaspersky! That would be a total of 6 sites. Be sure to round OFF the threat level, not UP or DOWN. Here are some cool sounds that can be used. Just make sure you convert them to a high bitrate before using. (UPLOADED)

Attached File(s)

•  testsnd.wav (91.94K)
  Number of downloads: 5
•  SOUND1.WAV (54.19K)
  Number of downloads: 1

This post has been edited by arbystrider: 12 October 2008 - 11:29 AM

[FinstereExistenz]

hey

very nice addon.. but, can you activeted this addon for firefox 3.1 beta 2 & 3??

thx

[Serevinus]

Hi,
I am currently testing VTL 0.4a under FF 3.1b2 on Windows 7 and it seems to be OK so far, assuming there are no problems I will release the update over the weekend.
I will post an update in this thread when 0.4 has been released.

[Serevinus]

I have changed the version information on Mozilla so you should now be able to download version 0.3 from there.
I have also released 0.41, but it is currently in a sandbox awaiting testing by an editor, if you wish to use 0.41 now, then you can download it from Mozilla Versions or the VTL homepage.
Feedback would be appreciated, along with any suggestions for future versions.

This post has been edited by Serevinus: 22 February 2009 - 02:50 PM
Reason for edit:: Added link to Mozilla Versions

[Serevinus]

I am thinking about adding a news feature to 0.6, but in order to do this I would need someone (or a small group of people) to spend a little time, on a regular basis, searching the internet for important or interesting security news. I am especially interested in people that already have a good understanding of how to stay safe online (security analysts maybe?), but anyone is welcome to apply.

VTL will probably display the latest 3 news items, with a full history accessible via the website, you will of course get full credit (and the warm fuzzy satisfaction of helping people stay safe) for the work that you do.

If you are interested, please post a reply here or send me a private message.

[landdong]

yeah its right love that toolbar extension also





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[hemanth]

Hi

Here,
http://www.mcafee.co...ter/default.asp

McAfee Avert Labs, Global Threat Condition - Severe

On VTL, only with McAfee set to update, the status is Normal (yellow)!

Why?

Hemanth