Darren New <dne### [at] sanrrcom> wrote:
> >   (And before anyone says anything, no, Windows is not better. Windows is
> > year after year always at the top of the list of most security flaws found
> > during the year.)

> Is this still true?  I think there's more 3rd-party flakey code, but not 
> stuff that comes with Windows necessarily. Certainly not as much as it used 
> to be.

  I don't know. I haven't been reading such reports lately. One would think,
though, that new OS = new bugs (unless Vista isn't really "new").

  But I still think it's fair to say that Linux is safer than Windows. Why?
For the simple reason that Linux is not such a popular *target* for attacks
and malware as Windows is. For example, basically 100% of email virii and
http exploits have targetted Windows. I'd bet at least 99.99% of more
traditional virii out there work only on Windows (and the older ones in
DOS). Almost 100% of malware (spyware, adware, trojans, rootkits...) target
Windows. While I have no idea how popular Windows as a target is among
crackers, I bet it's well over half of them for the simple reason that
Windows is way more widespread than Linux. (The only place where other
systems might rival Windows as a target of crackers is in the web servers
and other such servers, because there other systems are more popular than
in desktop computers.)

  Of course, Linux is in no way safe from attacks either. In fact, the linux
box of a good friend of mine got hijacked by a hacker some years ago (and it
remained so for a good amount of time, I think it was several weeks or even
months, without my friend noticing). However, usually these cases are direct
attacks by individual hackers, rather than being a massive attack by a
self-spreading program. You are much less likely to get your computer hacked
by someone directly, than by a self-spreading program (assuming you are
running an OS supported by that program). While I don't assume that my
linux box has not been hijacked without me noticing, I'd say it's pretty
unlikely.

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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