Slashdot Mirror
Ask Slashdot: How Are So Many Security Vulnerabilities Possible?
dryriver writes: It seems like not a day goes by on Slashdot and elsewhere on the intertubes that you don't read a story headline reading "Company_Name Product_Name Has Critical Vulnerability That Allows Hackers To Description_Of_Bad_Things_Vulnerability_Allows_To_Happen." A lot of it is big brand products as well. How, in the 21st century, is this possible, and with such frequency? Is software running on electronic hardware invariably open to hacking if someone just tries long and hard enough? Or are the product manufacturers simply careless or cutting corners in their product designs? If you create something that communicates with other things electronically, is there no way at all to ensure that the device is practically unhackable?
Yes, the big issue here is that it's common knowledge consumers by and large refuse to be bothered to get educated and the bulk of the major software development companies out there aren't don't have leadership ethical enough to be able to resist taking maximum possible advantage of their naivety. Unfortunately this knowledge gap is also being turned against our own government even as our own government participates in using the very same knowledge gap on the general population. It's a huge ugly mess, really, and it says a lot about the spiritual deficiencies of humans as a whole, and I still completely in all seriousness blame Microsoft for starting it.