Viruses, Spyware and...

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Wow

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Join Date: Aug 2003

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subtronic

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Junior Poster

Wow

Oct 15th, 2004

Just looking at all the difficulties people are having with MS Windows

Now seems like a good time to switch to Linux

-- I don't have any of these problems. But, I also don't play video games or use Photoshop either

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Join Date: Mar 2004

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kc0arf

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Posting Virtuoso

Re: Wow

Oct 15th, 2004

Hi,

The Mac is also a wonderful platform.

Linux could use a nice Photoshop equivalent. Yes, there is GIMP out there, but I believe it is limited to 256 colors. I'd like to see thousands / millions myself.

FreeCiv is a nice Linux game, along with Chess and the one my fiancee likes... the matching chinese symbols thing that she plays. I think there are a few other games out there for Linux that are Role Playing based. I wouldn't mind seeing a port of Diablo series to Linux.

There are some things that I have to keep my Mac for.... Linux is getting close to Desktop Completion, but not quite there yet. Then again OS X is really a wonderful Unix, although I concede that some things are laid out in a unique fashion. The important thing is that the spyware and bugs just bounce off our environments.

BUT

Any computer system can be compromised. Some a lot easier than others. But a wide open Linux box can cause problems too. Firewall out things that you do not need. If you are running samba internally, make sure your external firewall blocks the ports Samba desires. Don't run an FTP site. Don't run WebDAV externally. Use SSH instead of telnet. Make sure that you have a firewall, and are not running as the root user. And make backups, because hard drives and powersupplies do fail.

Christian

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Join Date: Aug 2003

Posts: 117

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subtronic

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Junior Poster

Re: Wow

Oct 16th, 2004

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Originally Posted by kc0arf

Hi,

The Mac is also a wonderful platform.

Linux could use a nice Photoshop equivalent. Yes, there is GIMP out there, but I believe it is limited to 256 colors. I'd like to see thousands / millions myself.

FreeCiv is a nice Linux game, along with Chess and the one my fiancee likes... the matching chinese symbols thing that she plays. I think there are a few other games out there for Linux that are Role Playing based. I wouldn't mind seeing a port of Diablo series to Linux.

There are some things that I have to keep my Mac for.... Linux is getting close to Desktop Completion, but not quite there yet. Then again OS X is really a wonderful Unix, although I concede that some things are laid out in a unique fashion. The important thing is that the spyware and bugs just bounce off our environments.

BUT

Any computer system can be compromised. Some a lot easier than others. But a wide open Linux box can cause problems too. Firewall out things that you do not need. If you are running samba internally, make sure your external firewall blocks the ports Samba desires. Don't run an FTP site. Don't run WebDAV externally. Use SSH instead of telnet. Make sure that you have a firewall, and are not running as the root user. And make backups, because hard drives and powersupplies do fail.

Christian

I guess the bottom line for both of us is: Why the hell are people putting up with this!?!?! It's insanity to me. It's like 99% of a MS Windows user's computing experience is spent trying to fix problems. It's bizarre to me

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Join Date: Nov 2003

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Zachery

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The Geek Father

Re: Wow

Oct 16th, 2004

Why switch to linux? I want to spend hours compiling any programs i want to run, updating tons and tons of config files, I want to spend hours tracking down and compiling drivers for my system. Not to mention most users don't like working at a console / prompt. Linux is not an anwser unless a user is very, very tech savvy. IE System Administrators, or you have time to do alot of learning, not to meniton you dont like games

Mac? While it is a very cool OS, even their cheepst computers are more expensive than most people want to spend on a new pc, i can run windows on this im happy.

windows is easy to use and work with on a daily baisis, and by default it is fairly well locked down believe it or not.

The only way to get spyware, is to do stupid things on the internet, browsing sites you do not trust, installing programs they "like" but dont relize what they do, using P2P sharing programs like kazaa, shearaza, etc. The users who are having all the problems with spyware are the ones who are putting it on their own pc by installing programs like weatherbug and password managers and tool bars. There are a few very malitious spyware programs that will install themselfs, but most require a user do somthing to run it.

Spyware would not be a problem if everyone was smart enough to run linux

Firefox: no, its not the end all solution, it has its own issues and in time it will be just as insecure as IE, when its hit Firefox 6, if it makes it that far. Oh, and AOL pays for it, incase you didn't know.

Microsoft & Windows: If you hate it so much, move to linux, or bsd, or anything else, stop complaning and move on.
Good starting places: Gentoo Novell SUSE Fedora Core Apple

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Join Date: Oct 2004

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catch

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Light Poster

Re: Wow

Oct 21st, 2004

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Originally Posted by subtronic

Just looking at all the difficulties people are having with MS Windows Now seems like a good time to switch to Linux -- I don't have any of these problems. But, I also don't play video games or use Photoshop either

Don't confuse lazy admins and a completely unhardened default configuration for "insecure." Remember the DOD-STD-5200.28 C2 and ISO 15408 CAPP/EAL4 evaluations? The Windows NT line is as secure as a commercial software should be. (and scores higher than Linux on both evaluations) They (Microsoft) have chosen a different marketing approach utilizing an insecure default configuration, which as any student of IS security would tell you is superior as it is more efficient to calculate the consequences of locking things than it is when unlocking things.

Need I remind you, no linux system has been formally validated at this time to handle data above unclassified. As I am sure you are aware there are standards that organizations must follow when dealing with data above the unclassified level. (By the way, NT does qualify)