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[OM] [OT] Viruses for Windows, MacOS, and Linux

Subject: [OM] [OT] Viruses for Windows, MacOS, and Linux
From: Joe Gwinn <joegwinn@xxxxxxxxxxx>
Date: Fri, 19 Mar 2004 18:55:27 -0500
At 3:26 AM +0100 3/18/04, Listar wrote:
>Date: Tue, 16 Mar 2004 21:47:27 -0800
>Subject: [OM] Re: [OT] eBay problems?
>From: Jim Brokaw <jbrokaw@xxxxxxxx>
>
>Guys - That's not really fair...! There are certainly virus's written for
>other OS's. But since Microsoft has 95% of the PC market, 95% of those
>affected will always be the Microsoft users. As the virus writers go to the
>biggest market, only about 5% of the virus's written will be for us Mac or
>Linux users... I think we will get another 'big' outbreak in a year or so...

But, Macs and Linux don't get even 5% of the trouble, so it isn't just random 
by relative population size.  Why?

Linux and MacOS 10 (and later) are both forms of UNIX.

While it's possible to hack into a UNIX system, and the methods are well known, 
it takes far more doing than with Windows, and is far more difficult to 
accomplish without knowing human effort (making viruses far harder to build).  
One has to crack the victims one by one.

The fundamental problem is that Microsoft never considered security a problem, 
and put all manner of ill-considered convenience "improvements" in, especially 
those allowing executable files received by email (or downloaded from a 
newsgroup) to be run, sometimes automatically.  Pictures and sound files and 
the like are not the problem, so preventing execution need not cause a 
noticable loss of internet functionality.  

If executables were not allowed by default, it would still be easy for someone 
to manually penetrate a computer from afar, but there would be no viruses 
because they would not be able to spread fast enough to be a problem.

Joe Gwinn



>Jim Brokaw
>OM-'s of all sorts, and no OM-oney...
>
>and a beige G3 running OS 9.2.2 in case you want to target me <g>
>
>
>on 3/16/04 3:55 PM, Ali at farali@xxxxxxxxxxxx wrote:
>
> > A virus...something that exposes the various flaws in Micr*soft products and
> > wreaks havoc!
> > 
> >-----Original Message-----
> > From: olympus-owner@xxxxxxxxxx [mailto:olympus-owner@xxxxxxxxxx]On
> > Behalf Of Richard Lovison
> > Sent: Tuesday, March 16, 2004 11:37 AM
> > To: olympus@xxxxxxxxxx
> > Subject: [OM] Re: [OT] eBay problems?
> > 
> > 
> > 
> > Virus???  What's that??  8^)
> > 
> > Richard - A happy Linux user


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