Security Isn't Just Avoiding Microsoft

Jay Singala noted a story which points out "It's time for all the people who have entertained this fantasy to stop deluding themselves. How would life without Microsoft be different? It wouldn't be in any meaningful way for those in charge of network security; there would just be a different vendor peddling the dominant operating system."

Comments

Re:Not exactly

[Gearoid_Murphy]

absolutely, but theres a considerable group of people out there who view animosity towards Microsoft as part of a broader resistance to big corporations, and as a consequence of this, view this resistance as being naive and unfounded. Unix style systems have been around for a long long time and have a well deserved reputation for stability and security, unlike windows products which I, as a computer scientist and software engineer experience as being badly concieved and poorly executed

Re:Not exactly

[wframe9109]

That's pretty funny, because from my experience, Unix has had a history rife with exploits and security issues... It *was* hacked to bits long ago. Good job!!!

Despite it's lesser market percentage, we still see exploits for Unix variants, and the services offered within. It's not some sort of impenetrable OS.

Anyhow. Security is in the hands of the user. Someone with half-decent security knowhow will be able to secure a Windows box far better than a newbie running Unix.

Seriously, editors... ENOUGH ALREADY

[freeweed]

This is the 3rd or 4th story in as many days that positively SCREAMS troll.

1. Find a common belief of Slashdot
2. Whine and bitch about "Slashdot bias" while not even understanding the point
3. When you don't get modded high enough for your complaining, find some blog that agrees with you
4. Get story linked to on Slasdot
4a. In this case, not even a link
5. Page Hits

Editors, I know you love to drive ad revenue by putting up these blatant trolls (OMG How Can I Love Open Source Without Copyright? If I Don't Like The RIAA I MUST Hate RMS!!!!!One!), but the joke's on you - most of us who respond to these out of annoyance run adblock.

Can we try for some actual stories now?

"Security" does not exist!

[khasim]

At least, that is what TFA says.

Networks in a world in which Apple had won the operating systems wars would still be insecure. What's that, you say? The Macintosh has had far fewer bugs reported and patched than Windows? That's true, but it's a consequence of the minuscule market penetration of Mac OS.

Got that? It's all about market share. There is no such thing as "security".

If everyone's house had no locks, they would be just as secure as if everyone's house had the best locks on the market.

If you put computers on a network and open that network to the outside world via the Internet, you're going to have security problems, regardless of whether you're running Windows, Mac OS, Linux or an operating system you created in your spare time.

I run Ubuntu (Feisty Fawn). By default it has NO open ports. That means that unless a worm can hit the TCP/IP stack, I am invulnerable to them.

He is an idiot. He doesn't even define "security" before he says that it doesn't exist.

My definition is: Security is the process of evaluating threats and reducing their effectiveness.

But once we've done all that, we're left with one unalterable fact: Users will still make errors galore.

You're an idiot.

So if we replace Windows with Ubuntu, and the number of cracked machines goes down from 10,000,000 to only 1,000 ... that doesn't mean that Ubuntu is more secure because 99% of the cracked machines would be Ubuntu.

So, what needs to be done? You must require users to attend formal information security training and awareness programs. No one should be left out.

Why do I get the feeling that this guy just bought stock in a training company?

If that approach was effective, we wouldn't have the problem we have today.

Re:Not exactly

[DevStar]

Where do people get this illusion that Unix systems were secure in the past? As an undergrad we would drive our friends crazy hacking into computers. Just about every Unix program they ran, from mail to finger to rn had security holes you could drive a car through.

The difference back then was no one cared if we broke into a computer. It just didn't make news. Heck, I remember that remote exploits stayed open for years, and no one said a peep. The world was very different back then. Plus there just wasn't much interesting to hack into. People would generally hack into other students accounts -- erase homework, put a bug in a friends assignment, send a goofy email from their professor's account, etc... You didn't have organized crime stealing credit cards, because no one besides geeks used computers.

I know this doesn't fit into your mental model of how Unix was this secure fort in the old days, but you'd better think again. Those of us who were there, know better.

I hate to sound cliche, but as long as we have people programming systems, there will be security holes. And I've worked at enough places to know that no one has a silver bullet.