[Gllug] p2p programs

Henry Gilbert henry.gilbert at gmail.com
Sun Nov 13 21:54:47 UTC 2005


> Let me guess.. Before you had security issues using Windows and before
> you knew better you were the guy who said "It will never happen to
> me?"
>
> New OS to play with but the same attitude?
>
> Linux has escaped (for a number of reasons) a lot of the security
> nightmares that other OS's suffer with, but that won't last forever.
>
> With such a lax attitude to security I fancy my chances better than
> yours of not being caught out
>

Still I don't get where the lax security would be on my part.

Answering to a question, Linux is not plagued by the security
nightmares and incidents Windows users suffer from.
That there is no spyware to worry about.
That there are no viruses in wild (not there ever was for a long time)

Most modern Linux distribution offer extra security in place,
SELinux is switched on by default in Fedora Red Hat
Mandrake and Suse (and others) have their own version of "Critical
Updates" easily set.
Some distros re-inforce sudo
Some distros nag if you log in X as root
(or won't let you fire any app unless you give explicit xhost localhost)

I've seen horror stories of people lax as Hell
when it came to Linux server administration.
And many here being sysadmin your job is to be paranoid.
A healthy professional stance.

The Desktop Linux user, Suse say just go about browsing the net,
playing the odd song, sending the odd email ...
shall I tell that person the situation is exactly the same
on Suse 10 as it was on Windows?

Naive as it seems (after all I am no admin by profession)
first thing I do on a fresh Linux installation is to close most
services ending up with a d (for demon) in the end .. specially sshd.
If there is no printer - then cupsd.
I close services to try and gain speed at least on boot-up.

Should I run chkrootkit and rkhunter daily also?

Or is it ok for once to relax and breathe fresh air?
Should I suggest there is no difference whatsoever between Windows and Linux.
What benefit is Windows patched - when some took over 3 months to produce.

Windows has been an extremely insecure system from top to bottom.
Switch on the internet and get infected without browsing.
Catch 22. Oh yes so you have install Firewall / Anti-Virus / Anti-Spyware etc ..

Is there an anti-spyware for Linux?
I know of Mac users that buy Anti-Viruses just to feel "safer"
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