Ask HN: Can we blame Windows for CrowdStrike outage?

CS needs some hardcore permissions to scan items on a VERY low level. So they can essentially push out shit code to screw up any OS. Including Mac and Linux. Don't see how MS/Windows are to blame for someone not testing a content update before pushing to the whole damn world. They should at least push out to a subset of users before destroying everyone's Friday!

Kinda. Yes. Apple moved away from deep kernel extensions years ago. They are no longer permitted on their latest releases.

Of course something like an EDR requires kernel level access otherwise it's too easy to bypass. But Apple has system extensions as a useful compromise. They're basically kernel level APIs that can be called by validated signed software. I think it's a good alternative to just allowing random code to run in the kernel.

The thing is, Apple has a habit of going to software vendors and saying: "We're changing this next year. There'll be a 2 year deprecation period and after that we'll lock you out. So change up or die off. We don't care."

Microsoft doesn't really do this and even if they do there's a lot of ifs and buts. They're much more receptive to the concerns of legacy software vendors because they represent a much bigger share of their market and the customer base (enterprise market) that cares about legacy is also very big and vocal.

Needless to say this is also the customer base that got heavily hammered by what happened today. But nobody thinks about that until it actually happens.

Back around 2000 or 2001 McAfee or Symantec (I can’t remember) released some virus definitions that caused Macs to kernel panic repeatedly. I worked at a college at the time which required students run it, and had to deal with the fallout.

OS X was using Unix back then as well, and the foundational design didn’t save it. But like you mention, Apple does more to protect the underlying system today than they did back then. I can’t even remember the last kernel panic I had. They used to be a semi-regular occurrence.

Yes.

https://www.macrotrends.net/stocks/charts/MSFT/microsoft/gro...

Windows and BSODs maybe still are trigger words for me, but IMO they are not to blame.

Windows is the platform, CrowdStrike makes a product on this platform and their users willingly install, accept all the security prompts and use it. Short of Apple-style locking users out of their own devices, there is little they can do here.

I'm not well-versed in Windows enough to be able to tell if they provide better ways and safe APIs to achieve what CrowdStrike does, but even if they did, there is no telling if CrowdStrike or anyone else would use that or not.

> but I feel that good OS should prevent a 3rd party app to cause such damage

It does? It also allows the owner of the machine to bypass those preventions, which is what CrowdStrike seem to require for their product to function.

I think the "OS should protect me from myself" is a very iPad-style expectation from computers. Personally I'm happy there are OSes that don't work this way.

> Would it happen on Linux?

$ modprobe crap-mod

I guess it would.