So now we know who they will blame for the next security issue. :p
Google ditches Windows on security concerns
111–120 of 158 posts
Re: Google ditches Windows on security concerns
#112Earlier quoted context omitted.
I, for one, am pretty bored by the market share defense. There are millions of macs out there, owned by people who could drop a little coin on their hardware, and that make them less of a target? There's not one virus writer out there who doesn't want the cred and the potential gain of a new audience of victims, many of whom are probably pretty complacent about security because they've never had to worry about it? Th…
While you might liken the rarity and the glamour of owning a Mac to that of owning a mansion, a thief has much more to gain by targeting a large house that's more likely to be filled with expensive electronics and jewels. On the other hand, I doubt that Macs are significantly more likely to contain data that a hacker would be looking for.
Hackers don’t want to sift your personal data for the most part (unless the sifting can be automated). It’s botnets that make them money.
Re: Google ditches Windows on security concerns
#113The main reason a Mac user (in practical terms) is more secure then a Windows user is because Mac users typically are using the latest version of the OS, whereas an typical Windows user is at least one SP behind, maybe more?. Especially if said Windows sits in an office environment where there is a very slow adaption rate. Also, any unauthorized copy of Windows is most likely never updated.
The main reason a Mac user is more secure than a Windows one is because a Mac system is running on a sounder security architecture (not administrator by default, etc.). You can only go that far in retrofitting an OS which made the wrong decisions on the start.
> The main reason a Mac user is more secure than a Windows one is because a Mac system is running on a sounder security architecture (not administrator by default, etc.)
In specific ways, how is OS X's security architecture more sound than Vista or Windows 7?
Re: Google ditches Windows on security concerns
#114Earlier quoted context omitted.
The main reason a Mac user is more secure than a Windows one is because a Mac system is running on a sounder security architecture (not administrator by default, etc.). You can only go that far in retrofitting an OS which made the wrong decisions on the start.
> The main reason a Mac user is more secure than a Windows one is because a Mac system is running on a sounder security architecture (not administrator by default, etc.) In specific ways, how is OS X's security architecture more sound than Vista or Windows 7?
To us - IT guys - they look alike, and we can stay away from dangers quite easily. To an average user - and I know what I'm talking about, since I've taught IT security to those average users - Windows' security architecture - UAC, applications (badly) designed to run as Administrator, ecc.- is full of pitfalls. I guess not everybody at Google is an hacker.
Re: Google ditches Windows on security concerns
#115Earlier quoted context omitted.
Of course they are not making a business decision for emotional reasons. By choosing an open source OS, Google gains more control on its systems, and avoids using a product of a competitor. Moreover, Google trusts its employees' judgement about a product: if you think your employees are competent, then you listen to them. If something, their decision weakens Microsoft.
Sure they are. They're saying "Windows has nothing to offer us, and there is no Windows software that our developers might want that justifies having Windows machines in our offices." If you work at Google and want to use, for example, CodeSmith, you have to get special permission from the CIO to build a Windows machine to install it on. Clearly CodeSmith is a good tool that developers might want to use, but because…
I guess this is a case where you choose not to buy a restaurant because you happen to like a specific dish ^_^
My understanding anyway is that Windows is allowed, if you can demonstrate a strong enough case for it.
Re: Google ditches Windows on security concerns
#116Is there any evidence that Windows 7 is less secured than Snow Leopard? Windows employs more advanced security techniques. IE has outlasted Safari in Pwn2Own since IE8. Windows releases security fixes much faster. If they favor OS X over Windows that is completely fine, but I think they are implying something that isn't true in regards to security. If someone exploits OS X on them, is everyone moving to Linux next?
Market share: Windows 90%, Mac 9%, Linux 1%. Where are virus writers going to put most of their effort? Windows being as secure as Mac wouldn't help make it safer because a lot more implemented exploits are going to exist in the wild.
And yet, when you looked at e.g. the web server data back in the early 2000's, you had 70% apache 25% IIS -- and yet about 20 times as many exploits (and much more effective at that) for IIS.
The reason was, to put it bluntly, that IIS was designed without any regard to real security, whereas Apache had _some_ regard to security.
That's also the case for Windows through its history; it has been making leaps recently, but doing things more securely requires it to become less convenient / not backwards compatible, and therefore it is still, relatively speaking, way more vulnerable when used by your average user.
I'm not up-to-date, but up until 2007 or so, a significant number of web browser vulnerabilities were directly or indirectly a result of Windows and Explorer's love of executing files after wrongly identifying them as e.g. wav or doc files.
The single Unix design decision that a file must have an executable flag out-of-band, and the convention that by default this flag is off, both of which date back to 1970, have kept Unix safe from these kinds of bugs. Sane default permissions on system directories are another decision; the latter has been adopted by Windows in XP SP2 IIRC, the former still hasn't.
Re: Google ditches Windows on security concerns
#117Earlier quoted context omitted.
I believe the Chinese government has Windows source code, and Google does not. The Darwin and BSD layers of Mac OS X are open source, so Google can at least study the code to understand the security implications of using OS X. In other words, with open source Google is on a more level playing field against potential attackers.
No offense, but level playing field is ridiculous. Think about what you're saying, you're saying Google is going to sit there and review all of the source code, and all patches and new releases to that source code. Really? Do you actually believe this... As per China having the source, do you really think it matters? If someone wants to break in, they're going to get in... (regardless if its Windows/Linux/Mac) why...…
> you're saying Google is going to sit there and review all of the source code, and all patches and new releases to that source code. Really? Do you actually believe this...
It's not crazy to pay someone on their security teams to review checkins to OSS apps they use. Saying 'OH MY GOD' loudly and repetitively doesn't consitute an argument and is rude to the parent poster. Be civil.
Re: Google ditches Windows on security concerns
#118Earlier quoted context omitted.
If they're using Linux, they can find and patch the vulnerability immediately. They could even have a team hunting through the source code looking for vulnerabilities to patch. On Windows, they would have to report the vulnerability to Microsoft, and hope that it's patched soon. It probably would be, but that's still an extra step - and they wouldn't be able to locate it with reference to the code. Also, as another p…
but this was rumored to be a zero-day attack, which means nobody knew about the exploit so it was as-of-yet unpatched. even if they we're running goobuntu with the full capability of patching the source and deploying fixes, a zero-day attack would have made it through in the beginning. switching operating systems is not going to secure against zero-day attacks.
Just imagine all their machines were running debian linux with the wrongly patched openssl binary. About 1024 different private/public keys to rule them all :-)
Re: Google ditches Windows on security concerns
#119 Closed source software = USSR
Open source software = USARe: Google ditches Windows on security concerns
#120Earlier quoted context omitted.
I, for one, am pretty bored by the market share defense. There are millions of macs out there, owned by people who could drop a little coin on their hardware, and that make them less of a target? There's not one virus writer out there who doesn't want the cred and the potential gain of a new audience of victims, many of whom are probably pretty complacent about security because they've never had to worry about it? Th…
But its not just the size of the market... Windows machines are more likely to come into contact with another windows machine than macs are to come in contact with other macs. Thus a mac virus will spread much more slowly... This is why homogeneity is dangerous. The more diversity an ecosystem has, the less vulnerable it is to viri, whether we're talking about crops or computer networks.
So then sites like this: cupidtino.com are really bad for Mac owners. Gotcha! :)