Firewall Wizards mailing list archives
Re: NT vs Unix on the Internet
From: "Joseph S. D. Yao" <jsdy () cospo osis gov>
Date: Wed, 6 May 1998 11:15:08 -0400 (EDT)
One point that has come up is along the lines of `most Internet sites that have been hacked have been running Unix therefore Unix is insecure'. Can anyone point me to some figures showing what sorts of sites have been broken into and what they were running, compared to the Internet as a whole?
Most criminals executed have been human. Therefore all humans are criminals. Sounds absurd, doesn't it? I w i s h that company execs were forced to take AND LEARN a course in elementary logic. Most Internet systems are Unix systems. Unix' range of securability is much wider than MS Wind-NT's. It can be made much more open - great if the system is not on a network. It can be made much more secure - which is desirable for those systems made publicly available on the Internet. Unfortunately, some number of Unix systems are thrust on the Internet without being properly secured. I think that, considering the vast number of Unix systems on the Internet, it is encouraging to see how few have been reported as hacked. Since MS Wind-NT has been more prevalent on the Internet, hackers have turned their attentions from Unix [that being the other point: if it's not there to hack, who wanted to try?] to MSWNT. They have, delightedly, pointed out many ways to compromise security and cause the dread Blue Screen of Death, in even "secured" MSWNT systems. Don't look for just numbers. Numbers don't lie; but they don't give you any meaningful interpretation of themselves. Look for the meaning behind the numbers. -- Joe Yao jsdy () cospo osis gov - Joseph S. D. Yao COSPO Computer Support EMT-A/B ----------------------------------------------------------------------- This message is not an official statement of COSPO policies.
Current thread:
- NT vs Unix on the Internet Peter Jeremy (May 04)
- Re: NT vs Unix on the Internet Pierre Beyssac (May 05)
- Re: NT vs Unix on the Internet Bennett Todd (May 07)
- <Possible follow-ups>
- RE: NT vs Unix on the Internet Peter Mayne (May 05)
- Re: NT vs Unix on the Internet Joseph S. D. Yao (May 07)
- RE: NT vs Unix on the Internet Paquette, Trevor (May 05)
- RE: NT vs Unix on the Internet Aleph One (May 07)
- RE: NT vs Unix on the Internet Ted Doty (May 07)
- RE: NT vs Unix on the Internet Russ (May 07)
- NT vs Unix on the Internet BVE (May 07)
- RE: NT vs Unix on the Internet Russ (May 09)
- Re: NT vs Unix on the Internet Pierre Beyssac (May 05)