Because Shiny Things Are Fun - The New New Windows v Linux Thread

Originally Posted by sycamorex I was referring to the notion that Linux Desktops might be more secure than Linux Servers, as one might understand your previous statement Just messing around...

No problemo

Originally Posted by foodown Why waste time writing a virus that could infect maybe 1% of all workstations when you could write one that can infect over 90%?

why waste time trying to crack 1% of all servers when you could crack into over 90% of banks, ecommerce, social network, dns routers, ...

the linux/ unix modularized kernel architecture is inherently safe-guarded from attacks that would bring down a monolithic type kernel such as win-nt (win-2k, win-xp, win-vista, win-7, win-8, win server 2k3, ...).

e.g.- blue-screens commonly occur from rouge device drivers accessing data from memory addresses it has no access to like a poorly written sound driver can bring down a windows system (all drivers in windows are absorbed into the kernel; thats why so many reboots are necessary). whereas with linux if the sound module is fubar then the music will stop playing but people would still be able to purchase stuff from your website.

Originally Posted by dalek I think they would try but I think it would be much more difficult for them to infect a Linux box. I'm not saying impossible just much more difficult. There will also always be a user that will install a software package named nasty_virus_but_install_anyway_and_I_promise_to_give_you_something_free. There will always be that percentage that just clicks and doesn't think first. For those, there is little to no hope anyway.

75 % of so called windows virises are probably trojan horses (read: stupid human error). however there are still some flaws in that system. i remember win-xp had a nasty bug where if you were not able to find a wifi hot spot, your laptop would automatically broadcast as an ad-hoc wireless network (with the ssid "free public wifi") allowing anyone close by to connect.
http://www.npr.org/2010/10/09/130451...ee-public-wifi

There ith no debating linukth ith better than windowth any day

Originally Posted by schneidz why waste time trying to crack 1% of all servers when you could crack into over 90% of banks, ecommerce, social network, dns routers, ...

Industrial servers are a LOT more difficult to compromise, regardless of operating system. Generally, you need a specific method to exploit each individual server or group of servers. You can't just use a general-purpose bug to attack servers resident in a professionally run data center.

Why? The main reasons are operators and firewalls. Who is building and configuring an industrial server? It's a professional system administrator; you don't have any wild-clicking end-users directly on the box to compromise it. Plus, almost without exception, they sit behind real firewalls which have been use-case configured by a professional network engineer.

If you checked out the membership of the bot nets being hired out these days, you're not going to find a whole lot of data center servers. You'll see home PCs and corporate workstations.

No operating system is 100% secure.

Originally Posted by commandguru No operating system is 100% secure.

They all are with no network card, modem, I/O port, keyboard, or mouse attached.

Originally Posted by foodown They all are with no network card, modem, I/O port, keyboard, or mouse attached.

It is, but it will be a boring computer...

Originally Posted by foodown They all are with no network card, modem, I/O port, keyboard, or mouse attached.

Some are pretty secure even with all that as long as there is no person in the chair. A lot of problems are the user, not the computer. If a person clicks on spam or some other link in a email that they should know not to, then that causes problems. If you are using windoze, you have to be really careful what you click on.

That said, I have never had problems with my Linux box. I surf whereever I want to and no problems.

My wife is one of those people that checks out a lot of things online and I'm very happy to say using Linux she has yet to pick up a virus.

.dll's are why windows fails for the most part IMHO.

Originally Posted by linuxpokernut .dll's are why windows fails for the most part IMHO.

Care to explain?

I believe he's referring to "DLL Hell", or the phenomenon when one updates a particular DLL that a bunch of programs depend on to a newer version, and because of A[PB]I changes or what have you, it breaks one or all of them. You have the same/similar problem on Linuxen with dependency hell, .so symlinking, etc., neither of which I've encountered often, but they do exist.

EDIT: Also, hi.

EDIT 2: Another thing is that what I've actually noticed is that it happens less often with Windows applications, because a lot of them are either statically linked, or provide their own copies of libs. *nixen 9/10 times have everything organized according to the FHS, which has all shared libs in a single (few) director(y|ies).

Originally Posted by dalek Some are pretty secure even with all that as long as there is no person in the chair. A lot of problems are the user, not the computer. If a person clicks on spam or some other link in a email that they should know not to, then that causes problems. If you are using ǝzopuıʍ, you have to be really careful what you click on. That said, I have never had problems with my Linux box. I surf whereever I want to and no problems.

(not to mention social engineering)

Same here! Sorry about the misquote couldn't help myself...

Anyone with billion$, in a world of billions, is trying to twist your arm! CEO$ (not a prompt lol) don't drive innovation developers\we do; Thanks Open Source!
Loving #! by the way!

I think that Linux is more secure than Windows. I have seen lots of Windows viruses and malware, but I don't realy get anything in the Linux box and virtual machine that I use all of the time. I don't think that there is much of a comparison between Windows and Linux, Linux whops Windows. Windows may have a use, for instance, my ISP doesn't support linux, so I have to use Windows as a sort of server.