Though it could have been worse, the Slammer worm that crippled networks last weekend at a pace of 200,000 to 300,000 attacks per hour really shouldn’t have been as big or as widespread as it was. Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT) had discovered the vulnerability in its SQL Server 2000 software back in July and had issued a patch for it. In fact, companies that had installed SQL Service Packs 2 or 3 or patches from other sources issued since the security hole was discovered escaped virtually unscathed, which brings us to the big question: How could Slammer have had such a devastating effect if the patch was available? Full Story