[LUAU] Its time to simply ban Windoze machines from the Internet

Jim Thompson jim at netgate.com
Thu Oct 19 03:06:41 PDT 2006


On Oct 18, 2006, at 8:19 PM, Tim Newsham wrote:

>> Its not that simple.   Windows boxes are a heckuva lot easier to  
>> populate with the software that creates botnets.   They're an open  
>> infection vector.
>
> I don't agree at all.  There are sufficient server and client  
> vulnerabilities in *BSD, linux, OS X and windows.  Many of the  
> attacks don't even rely on any software vulnerability but on the  
> poor judgement and bad practices of end users.  These same problems  
> exist in the unix population.  The software for all aspects of a  
> the malware would be substantially similar across all existing  
> popular platforms.  The only major differentiator is the return on  
> investment.  Writing attacks for windows makes more economical  
> sense for attackers.

Please.   Windows is *full* of holes, and by default, it essentially  
runs as "root" (or the Windows equivalent).

(Just like Linspire, which sucks too.)

I've had linux machines on the wide-open net for years with nary an  
issue (save a RedHat machine in 1999 or so that got rooted when it  
was sitting in my home at the end of a T1 line.)

Go ahead, put your XP machine up on a raw, unfiltered IP connection.   
See how long it lasts.

jim




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