Re: Woohooo! Dell + Linux

Moreover, most of Windows users are running their home OS with the
administration rights all day long, they used to download and install
lots of non-opened freeware from the web.

Well, they just do lots of important/dangerous/admin tasks that should
be done normally with a lot of care. Linux learns you these notions
that lots of basic MS users lack. Just tell linux users to ride their
boxes as root, installing lots of binaries not managed by their
distros without extra care, updating as much often as new versions
come out without thinking about stability, and you would see a huge
smile on their faces, with a "good joke !" comment. This is the
cultural gap.


Gal'

2007/4/20, Joe Hart <j.hart@xxxxxxxxx>:
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Johannes Wiedersich wrote:
> Jim Hyslop wrote:
>> Ron Johnson wrote:
>>> There's [...] no need for Symantec anti-virus
>>> products.
>> I'm curious why you say that. I'm fairly new to Linux, but I understand
>> it is more robust and secure than MS Windows. Still, it's not totally
>> secure - nothing made by humans could be. So, do you mean that there's
>> no need for Symantec because of the freely available alternatives, or
>> because Linux just doesn't need anti-virus protection, or something else
>> altogether?

The main reason is because almost all virus programs target Windows and
will not run on Linux. However, proof of concept viruses have been
shown and when they are, the system is usually patched to not allow that
type of concept to work.

>
> Linux is not 100% secure. But it has a different attitude to security
> and to viruses.
>
Yes.
> If a virus hits a windows box, it is a personal mishap, but one can buy
> a special software to detect and delete the virus.
>
Unless it wasn't a real mean virus and wiped the user's pc clean.
That's one of the major differences. If one is using a user account in
Linux, a virus would be limited in its ability to damage files outside
of the userspace (ie. /home/username).

> If a virus hits a linux box (it rarely happens), it is considered a
> security hole. The developers analyse the path the virus got in, fix it
> and neither that nor any virus of similar kind will be able to spread
> again.
>
> This is a simplification, of course, but I hope you get the point.
>
> Johannes
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Linux_computer_viruses

nice link. It seems that most of the virus and worm programs listed
there are old and no longer a threat. Want a good comparison, take a
look at this:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virus_statistics

Joe
- --
Registerd Linux user #443289 at http://counter.li.org/
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