Security with Linux - Newbie

[nocturn]

Lindsay Wrote: 
> I have been of the understanding that Linux is relatively virus and
> intruder safe.  How accurate is my understanding of this?
> -- 
> ubuntu-users mailing list
> ubuntu-users at lists.ubuntu.com
> http://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/listinfo/ubuntu-users

Well, first off, there are many different versions of Linux out there,
so I'll focus on ubuntu.

There are few viruses around for Linux, in theory it is quite possible
to write them, but they would mostly target one distribution and often
be limited to the rights of the user that is logged on at the time of
infection.

Ubuntu has a policy of not opening any ports on a default install, this
means that there are no vulnerable services exposed to the network.  Any
vulnerability is restricted to software ran by the user and is then
again contained to the userid running.

It is hard to explain the security concept in Linux/Unix in a few
lines, but  mainly it boils down to this.
*nix has been designed as a multi-user system from the ground up,
running on top of a filesystem that requires permissions.
Windows has been built as a single user system with no restriction
whatsoever.  In recent versions of windows, multi-user functions and
permissions are being retrofitted on the old system, but this breaks
many things.  For that reason, many functions default back to the old
dogma of one-user-everything-open.

This leads to diffent approaches.  On Linux, you open up services you
need coming from a locked down system.
A new Windows system is rather open by default an has to be locked
down.


-- 
nocturn