[Off Topic] Re: Linux security

[Daniel Carrera]

Michael T. Richter wrote:
> On Thu, 2006-04-05 at 21:07 +0200, Alan McKinnon wrote:
> 
>>If Daniel's family are getting 0wned, then either there is a family 
>>member that isn't following the rules and infecting everyone else or 
>>there is a hole out there that he hasn't taken into account.
> 
> And I suspect the former.  Whenever I hear people say "but I didn't do 
> anything hazardous" -- and I mean 100% of the time -- a bit of digging 
> finds that they practised unsafe computing.  And it often only takes one 
> moment of inattention.

I doubt it, but let's assume that that's what happened. If all it takes 
is one moment of inattention to render the computer useless, that tells 
me that the system is seriously broken. An operating system should *not* 
require constant concentration to use successfully. A system that is as 
fragile as you describe is *not* secure. A secure system has sane 
defaults, fails gracefully, and is resilient to small errors.

Cheers,
Daniel.
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