This is stupid

[shade11]

I was scrolling through the microsoft website to see what results they had on Linux and I came up with this:

(Link doesnt work so here is a quote)


Summary

In this non-sponsored report, Forrester collected a year's worth of data and analyzed Windows and four key Linux distributors on key metrics of responsiveness to vulnerabilities, severity of vulnerabilities, and thoroughness in fixing flaws.
•

Responsiveness: On average, Microsoft had a fix available 25 days after a security issue was publicly disclosed.
•

Thoroughness: Microsoft was the only vendor to have corrected 100% of the publicly known flaws during the study's time period.
•

Relative Severity: Windows has the fewest vulnerabilities and the fewest "high severity" vulnerabilities of any platform measured.

Included in This Document
•

Executive Summary
•

Understanding the Vulnerability Life Cycle
•

What Matters: Responsiveness, Relative Severity, and Thoroughness
•

Microsoft, Debian Fix Fast; Red Hat, MandrakeSoft Miss Few Flaws
•

Handling Competing Platform Requirements
•

Supplemental Material

o.O Yeah sure. . . Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiight

I know that it doesn't include Ubuntu in it, but Linux in general is more secure than And it really ticks me off that someone would think that windows is more secure. Please post bad comments and stuff.

[byen]

Please post bad comments and stuff
LoL.. thats the first time ive seen some one ask that..LMAO :-) but on the other hand... should we be suprised with MS?

[shade11]

They say that they are not affiliated with that comment but I am sure that they were the ones who made that comment.

[briancurtin]

but Linux in general is more secure than And it really ticks me off that someone would think that windows is more secure.
you can make windows bulletproof if you want to
you can make linux as loose as a goose if you want to

i will never take the results seriously of any compaison of windows and linux. they all have an agenda to push. "neutral" sources most likely arent neutral, and they come up with asinine findings. just ignore all of this garbage.

[shade11]

Well lets look at it this way:

Compare a fresh install of Linux and Windows.

What do we get? Linux will have barely anything happen to it while Windows will have viruses and hackers galore. (Linux may have 1 or 2 hackers becuase they may need a firewall i.e. Firestarter)

My windows is not bulletproof, it is armegheddon proof. But I have many diffrent pieces of software that protect it. Though I know that there will be a day for me when I finally nuke my windows partition.

I agree, that article is rubbish.

[prizrak]

Well lets look at it this way:

Compare a fresh install of Linux and Windows.

What do we get? Linux will have barely anything happen to it while Windows will have viruses and hackers galore. (Linux may have 1 or 2 hackers becuase they may need a firewall i.e. Firestarter)

My windows is not bulletproof, it is armegheddon proof. But I have many diffrent pieces of software that protect it. Though I know that there will be a day for me when I finally nuke my windows partition.

I agree, that article is rubbish.
Not entirely true, a fresh install of XP SP2 will be pretty secure on the web, it has the Firestarter style packet filter OOTB as well. Outdate Linux is just as easy to break into as outdated Windows. The defaults are much better in most Linux distros (Linspire runs in root OOTB :confused: ) Linux is much better on servers because of how customizeable it is more than anything else.

[shade11]

Windows is still easily hackable. But Linux is harder to hack. Linux has few viruses that were able to destory it. Windows has millions. Spyware doesnt effect Linux but Windows keeps getting it over, and over.

What is surprizing is that my friend has Windows only (Does not want to see the light of Linux.) and he never updates and he doesnt even use an antivirus. He doesnt use a firewall at all. He does have a Firewall but it is never on. It is used so he can get the network security key from school. He never got hacked at all. No viruses either. It stumps me. He doesnt have any security measures whatsoever. And he just keeps installing stuff. The only exception is 1 or 2 minor adware. It is strange.

[YourSurrogateGod]

I wish I could go on a rant right now, but it's late and I'm tired.

[riff_79]

What is surprizing is that my friend has Windows only (Does not want to see the light of Linux.) and he never updates and he doesnt even use an antivirus. He doesnt use a firewall at all. He does have a Firewall but it is never on. It is used so he can get the network security key from school. He never got hacked at all. No viruses either. It stumps me. He doesnt have any security measures whatsoever. And he just keeps installing stuff. The only exception is 1 or 2 minor adware. It is strange.

Does he do much internet related activities? He is proberly going through a nat device.

[shade11]

Does he do much internet related activities? He is proberly going through a nat device.

He is on the internet wherever he can be. He can bypass the schools server and download somthing that the server says no to as well.

[lorenco]

Some independent comments (tainted by the fact the I only run Linux for the last 2 months... :D )

1. They measured this over the period of a year
Which year (1995 ??)
2. Which distro's did they use Redhat 3.0 ?
3. How do they measure security fixes and who classified the security flaws? I do not want to run for a month with a know worm hole,do you? But if you have a buffer overflow vunrability it is low and maybe I can run with that for 10 years, if the worst thing is getting a core dump ... or allowing a user non privilaged access that I can see in the logs in any case....

ps. Does Windows have protected log files for Privileged access (like SUDO logs it with no Group / User access (mode 500 (NadaNada) ?) I can't remember ?:D

This is the comapny that made the official statement that 50% of all Windows crashes are caused by outside vendors... Does that now mean they take (finnaly) reponsability for the other 50% ?

[ardchoille]

I was scrolling through the microsoft website to see what results they had on Linux and I came up with this:

(Link doesnt work so here is a quote)



o.O Yeah sure. . . Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiight

I know that it doesn't include Ubuntu in it, but Linux in general is more secure than And it really ticks me off that someone would think that windows is more secure. Please post bad comments and stuff.
You have to realise that Microsoft plays with words and facts in their "reports", so here's an explanation:

"Responsiveness: On average, Microsoft had a fix available 25 days after a security issue was publicly disclosed."
The fix was available to whom? The Microsoft devs? The Microsoft office workers? Bill Gates? Stating that "the fix was available.." was actually true, but to whom was the fix available? Notice that they didn't say "the fix was available to all Windows end users". Microsoft preaches just enough of the truth to justify what they do.. you'll never hear the whole truth from them. Now I know this may sound stupid, but it's actually how Microsoft gets away with so much. It's sad that this little "word play" tactic works on some folks.

[TechSonic]

I hate Microsofffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffff ffffffffffffffffffffffff HELP BILL GATES IS CHOCKKKKINGGGGGGGGGGG ME!!!!!!111111111111111111111111111111111111111111 1111111111

[briancurtin]

^ huh?

[egon spengler]

What is surprizing is that my friend has Windows only (Does not want to see the light of Linux.) and he never updates and he doesnt even use an antivirus. He doesnt use a firewall at all. He does have a Firewall but it is never on. It is used so he can get the network security key from school. He never got hacked at all. No viruses either. It stumps me. He doesnt have any security measures whatsoever. And he just keeps installing stuff. The only exception is 1 or 2 minor adware. It is strange.

It isn't that surprising to me, I think that Linux fans often overstate how suceptible to malware Windows is.

Actually not just Linux fans, before Linux was even on the horizon for me I heard countless people go on about the importance of taking drastic steps to increase security in Windows. At times I was paranoid that AVG and Spybot were not working because I saw no evidence of them fending off these hordes of invaders I should have supposedly been seeing as a Windows suer

[Ultimo Aliento]

I suposse that many here read the "Yankee group report " about linux vs windows, that was on the windows home page some months ago... i just keep laughing when i remember the lines of that report ;)

But cmon ... that is just corporate policy, it's something that should be expected... they see a competitor, they would do anything in his hand to take him down to the ground, to the center of the earth if they could.

And i would have a lot of doubts about the so called "experts" that made that report ;)

[BSDFreak]

Well lets look at it this way:

Compare a fresh install of Linux and Windows.

What do we get? Linux will have barely anything happen to it while Windows will have viruses and hackers galore. (Linux may have 1 or 2 hackers becuase they may need a firewall i.e. Firestarter)

My windows is not bulletproof, it is armegheddon proof. But I have many diffrent pieces of software that protect it. Though I know that there will be a day for me when I finally nuke my windows partition.

I agree, that article is rubbish.

Ok, my favourite Linux distro is Slackware.

Slackware after install: no firewall and wide open
XP with SP2 after install: firewalled

Now what? Well we could go OpenBSD that is considered the most secure OS of all and install that and STILL be behind XP/SP2 in terms of security.

All this proves one thing, a stupid user or a lazy admin will make the most secure OS of all insecure.

Which is the point, you can secure ANY OS, but out of the box Xp/SP2 is generally pretty secure even in comparison with other systems.