criminals could easily create a package that uses a name produced by common AI services and cram it full of malware

the average percentage of hallucinated packages is at least 5.2% for commercial models and 21.7% for open-source models, including a staggering 205,474 unique examples of hallucinated package names, further underscoring the severity and pervasiveness of this threat

Of course, the developer usually does not do this out of malice, but rather to profit more at the users' expense. That does not make it any less nasty or more legitimate.

Yielding to that temptation has become ever more frequent; nowadays it is standard practice. Modern proprietary software is typically an opportunity to be tricked, harmed, bullied or swindled.

Software designed to function in a way that mistreats the user is called malware.

Microsoft is using malware tactics to get users to switch to their web browser, Microsoft Edge, and their search engine, Microsoft Bing. When users launch the Google Chrome browser Microsoft injects a pop up advertisement in the corner of the screen advising users to switch to Bing. Microsoft also imported users Chrome browsing data without their knowledge or consent.

Wyróżniamy 2 podstawowe metody wykrywania malware(można mówić o większej ilości, jednak na potrzeby przybliżenia podstaw wspomnę tylko o dwóch):

I do not understand what is the threat model of not allowing the root user to configure Firefox, since malware could just replace the entire Firefox binary.

Guaranteed Spyware Free

Advertisements are often injected with malware.

With version 6.1.4, the Foxit installer was bundled with potentially unwanted programs like OpenCandy which installed the browser-hijacking malware Conduit.[11][12] Following complaints from users, it was removed after version 6.2.1.[13] In July 2014, the Internet Storm Center reported that the mobile version for iPhone was transmitting unencrypted telemetry and other data to remote servers located in China despite users attempting to opt out of such data collection.[14]