So that was 2008. Roll on 2009.
I thought some of you might be interested in what the most popular blog entries on the Clu-blog were during 2008.
(Caveat: The blog wasn’t running for the whole of the year and stats weren’t collected for all of the time it was live to the public, so this may well be nonsense. But hey, it’s interesting nonsense. It will be better next year, I promise.)
So without further ado, lets kick off proceedings in true beauty contestant style in reverse order, starting with positions 10 to 6.
10th. Do you really need anti-virus on your Apple Mac?
Oh, the furore that resulted as Apple wobbled back and forth over whether it should or shouldn’t advise Mac users to run anti-virus software.
I wouldn’t be surprised if we saw more rumbles around Apple Mac security during 2009.
9th. Results of McAfee-sponsored West Coast Labs anti-virus test
I try and keep self-puffery and the marketroids out of the Clu-blog as much as possible, although a few shameless plugs slip through the net.
However, this story proved popular enough to make it into our top ten articles of the year, presumably because it’s somewhat different than the typical good review.
What makes this test interesting is that the West Coast Labs tests were paid for by McAfee, one of our largest competitors. They make the review available for download from their website, but they didn’t come top according to West Coast Labs’ research.
Kudos to the guys at McAfee for not sweeping it under the carpet, and actually they didn’t perform badly in the tests.
8th. BNP membership list posted on the internet
When it was discovered that the membership list of the highly controversial British National Party, complete with names and addresses, had been published on the internet the resulting stampede of Googlers hunting for it came as no surprise.
This blog entry received a large amount of traffic although – as you can see in the blog post – we were careful to disguise the personal names and addresses of BNP members in the snapshot we published.
7th. London hospitals hit by computer virus
St Bartholomew’s (Barts) in the City, the Royal London Hospital in Whitechapel and the London Chest Hospital in Bethnal Green had their networks shut down after being struck hard by a variant of the Mytob worm.
Concerns were raised about patient confidentiality and the quality of care as some workers had to resort to using paper and pen.
Eventually the hospitals announced that they had remedied their security problem and were on the road to recovery.
6th. Your internet access is going to get suspended – NOT
Judging by the large number of page views that this blog post received, an awful lot of people received emails in the last third of 2008, claiming that they had committed “illegal activities” such as pirating software, movies or music. The emails went on to warn that recipient’s internet access would be suspended.
Opening the attached report was definitely not a good idea, however, as it contained malicious code designed to compromise your Windows PC, and hand control over to remote hackers.
When they’re not tempting you with nude pictures of Nicole Kidman or Angelina Jolie, they’re threatening to cut off your net access..
Now learn about the top five stories on the Clu-blog during 2008.
