"PC's get more virus's than Macs'"

[Nothinman]

VNC can manage a remote host without the VNC client installed? And Dameware can get into a 2000 box or 2003 server that doesn't have terminal services installed/running. There's a bunch of other things Dameware can do remotely as well. I'm not sure if those tools are available in VNC or not. I haven't used VNC in a long while.

No, but you can remotely install and start the VNC service just like Dameware does with it's own remote control stuff. And I know Dameware does more than that but the last time I looked at it the only thing I really used was the remote control because once you get a desktop you should have everything you need.

 

[Smilin]

Originally posted by: Robor
EDIT: I SUCK AT REPLYING TO QUOTED REPLIES!

Same here. This is why I never argue with n0cmonkey. He's good at it and It's just not worth the effort. If you start pulling ahead he'll pull some mixed triple double quotes on you and it will take you 30 minutes only to discover you've argued with yourself on accident. I suggest you let the wookie win.

 

[n0cmonkey]

Originally posted by: Smilin

Originally posted by: Robor
EDIT: I SUCK AT REPLYING TO QUOTED REPLIES!

Same here. This is why I never argue with n0cmonkey. He's good at it and It's just not worth the effort. If you start pulling ahead he'll pull some mixed triple double quotes on you and it will take you 30 minutes only to discover you've argued with yourself on accident. I suggest you let the wookie win.

Thanks for the funniest thing I've read all day. :laugh:

 

[drag]

Apache 2.2 actually seems fairly decent.

Apache 2.0 wasn't very good in terms of security.. they had a huge change of the archatecture and did a lot of realy realy big changes to make it much more capable. Compete overhaul of the codebase and made it much more capable of handling multithreads and all sorts of fancy stuff.

Apache liked it because it made their product much more impressive.. most regular folk hated it because they aren't going to need any of the new features and it broke compatability with their existing add-ons and everybody knows that big changes bring big bugs, especially with Apache pushing on what their capable of.

It's hoped that with Apache 2.2 it's had more time to mature.

There are some things to keep in mind about Apache:
1. Most people that are doing big sites are still using 1.3. There was features that are missing in 2.0 that a lot of people use, but are there in 2.2
2. 1.3 is still maintained and fairly active.
3. A lot of 'real' sites don't actually run vanilla Apache. They tend to run something that is customized for their environment or bought from a commercial vendor.

Even goes so far as to say that many Linux distributions aren't even using Apache 2.x by default.. but they will probably use 2.2.

For instance in Debian Stable when you go: "apt-get install apache", you get 1.3.3
For instance Slackware released it's latest Slackware 11 just recently and it uses Apache 1.3.x by default also. These are both the latest releases of those distributions and are very commonly used by professionals that can choose the OS they use.

A thing to keep in mind about IIS 6 is that in it's default configuration it doesn't actually do much. It doesn't realy do much by itself. Pretty much it can serve static html pages. As soon as you as a administrators start enabling features, like for example the ability to do ASP.NET, then you start to run into software that has multiple vunerabilities in the past. So it's not like 'oh the last IIS vunerability was in 2005 so if I don't apply any patches then my system will be secure'. Nope, doesn't work like that.

And it's not that much different with Apache. If you look at it the large number of vunerabilities comes from Apache_mod this or mod that.

If I choose to run Apache 2.0 + PHP for a website then that vs IIS 6 looks like increadably large amounts of crap.
If I choose to run Apache 1.3 + Perl or Python for a website then that vs IIS 6 doesn't look so bad, when you enable enough features to get equivelent functionality.

So you have to analize the situation a little bit more critically then just # of vunerabilities vs # of vunerabilities.

The way Microsoft arranges for it's vunerabilities to be disclosed leads to very very misleading statistics vs how Open source community release advisories.

For instance compare:
Redhat AS 3 (released 2003):
http://secunia.com/product/4669/?task=statistics
vs
Windows 2003:
http://secunia.com/product/1173/?task=statistics

Ok it's 310 Redhat vunerabilities vs 102.

Pretty damning, right?
Wrong.

Look at the actual vunerabilities for the systems..
Gzip, KDEgraphics, imagmagick?? These are reported as _remote_ vunerabilities. I doubt they are realy exploitable, just potentially. They are just bugs in those programs that could or could not be a real problem.

Now look at Windows 2003.
What software does 2003 ship with?
Internet Explorer, ASP.NET, IIS 6 are some examples.

Exect for IE there hasn't been a whole lot of exploitable holes aviable for those things, but they do exist. So look at the advisories for 2003...
Were are the ASP.NET vunerabilities? Were are the IIS 6 holes?
They are no were to be found. Because I guess they aren't part of 'Windows 2003' product?! I have no clue

Look at IE. A hundred and six vunerabilities for IE 6. In 2006 there have been 14 vunerabilities, many of them criticial, many of them unpatched.
NONE of those show up in Windows 2003. Out of 106 advisories only about _3_ show up as Windows 2003 vunerabilties?

With Redhat they list seperate advisories for Seamonkey and Firefox, even though it's the same problem for both of them.

I mean, seriously, this is bad. This looks fine on paper and on good when your doing Linux vs Windows arguements.. but as a administrator it makes how Microsoft catagorizes (or at least how Secunia arranges the advisories) virtually impossible to actually determine what problems your system has and what needs patching. It's nearly worthless.

It's the same thing with Apache vs IIS, but not quite as bad. But still. Even when you look at the statistics intellegently and not now they are mis-represented by Secunia then IIS 6 still is quite nice security-wise. Much better then Apache 2.0. Also IIS + ASP.NET is very much nicer then say Apache + PHP.

This is were currently most Linux distributions do a great disservice to a lot of people. They are much more interested in shipping the latest and greatest with all the spanking new features rather then concentrating on what matters. There are only a couple popular ones that I feel do a decent job. Slackware, Debian Stable, Redhat.

Of course if security realy mattered for webpages to most people we'd all be using OpenBSD + their Apache version + Perl or Python.

 

[Scooby Doo]

Geez people still are complaining about yenc. It's been in use how many years now?

 

[pcgeek11]

Originally posted by: gwag
Cause this will never happen on a mac, unless of course its a new mac running windows or a mac running virtual PC or maybe a mac running parallels desktop and some form of windows.

This is so phoney and retarded, words escape me. I have been using and working with PC's ( Read this as X86 machines with DOS and Windows ) since 1987 and have never had a virus, worm or any other nasties. I have seen them on others PC's due to user stupidity though.

pcgeek11

 

[Markbnj]

Originally posted by: pcgeek11

Originally posted by: gwag
Cause this will never happen on a mac, unless of course its a new mac running windows or a mac running virtual PC or maybe a mac running parallels desktop and some form of windows.

This is so phoney and retarded, words escape me. I have been using and working with PC's ( Read this as X86 machines with DOS and Windows ) since 1987 and have never had a virus, worm or any other nasties. I have seen them on others PC's due to user stupidity though.

pcgeek11

I've had one in a similar amount of time, and it was a doozy. In a moment of stupidity I followed a link sent to me in email by a colleague, and got whacked. It was some adware delivery tool that immediately replaced my desktop, started flashing virus warning popups, and other stuff. It infected wininet.dll and other system files that would cross check each other, and was a real pain in the ass to get rid of. Recently I finally managed to get ABetterInternet.Aurora off of my daughter's machine using Windows Defender, largely because being MS's own tool, it knew how to shut down and repair explorer.exe and its configuration settings.

Is Windows uniquely vulnerable to this kind of attack? Maybe. I'm not enough of an expert to say, even though I have some pretty good system programming chops. To make statements about relative vulnerability presumes you know the vectors by which a system would be attacked if people were working on finding ways to attack it. I'm not convinced that anyone has demonstrated that we are good at predicting all those vectors.

One thing definitely is unique about the PC and Windows, though: it stands alone in terms of serving the market base it serves, and in being forced to provide nearly seamless backwards compatibility with all previous versions of the O/S and applications, across tens of millions of installs. I still have little graphics programs that I wrote back in the late eighties, that write directly to the VGA hardware, and I can run them under XP today. I have old DOS and Windows 3.1 applications that I still occasionally run, and they all work. Probably the largest amount of upgrade trouble I have had in twenty years was moving to dual core and shaking out the issues in realtime games. So it's a bit of a trade-off. I'm not arguing that Microsoft deliberately planned to maintain a certain level of compatibility as a trade-off against security. Maybe they are just lazy. But in one specific area, account access rights, they have almost certainly had to make deliberate trade-offs to keep old stuff working.

 

[Scarpozzi]

Mac OS isn't much of a target for viruses because it's less than 10% of the market. As for the PCs, they're usually cheaper so anyone can get a PC...meaning they've got less training and won't necessarily patch every other tuesday.

PCs, do get more viruses than the Macs, but Macs barely exist when compared to the number of PCs out there.

 

[nweaver]

Originally posted by: Scarpozzi
Mac OS isn't much of a target for viruses because it's less than 10% of the market. As for the PCs, they're usually cheaper so anyone can get a PC...meaning they've got less training and won't necessarily patch every other tuesday.

PCs, do get more viruses than the Macs, but Macs barely exist when compared to the number of PCs out there.

we debunked that myth, earlier, read the thread...

i.e. IIS5 has a MUCH smaller marketshare then apache, but there are MANY more vunerabilites/attacks against it then apache, in spite of the greater number of apache servers versus IIS5 servers.

 

[ForumMaster]

dude:
first, it's a commercial. second, it's clearly talking about windows. you can't deny that there are more viruses for windows then for OS X. this is due to low market share but also a more secure kernel design.

 

[rbV5]

I'd like some Apple/Mac users to explain this one

Users need to defend marketing now?

 

[drag]

Originally posted by: pcgeek11

Originally posted by: gwag
Cause this will never happen on a mac, unless of course its a new mac running windows or a mac running virtual PC or maybe a mac running parallels desktop and some form of windows.

This is so phoney and retarded, words escape me. I have been using and working with PC's ( Read this as X86 machines with DOS and Windows ) since 1987 and have never had a virus, worm or any other nasties. I have seen them on others PC's due to user stupidity though.

pcgeek11

Double clicking on a email attatchment and launching a program by mistake isn't user stupidity.. it's a severe design flaw.

Same thing with having files that are executable by naming them cool.jpg.exe

Design flaw.

 

[nweaver]

Originally posted by: drag

Originally posted by: pcgeek11

Originally posted by: gwag
Cause this will never happen on a mac, unless of course its a new mac running windows or a mac running virtual PC or maybe a mac running parallels desktop and some form of windows.

This is so phoney and retarded, words escape me. I have been using and working with PC's ( Read this as X86 machines with DOS and Windows ) since 1987 and have never had a virus, worm or any other nasties. I have seen them on others PC's due to user stupidity though.

pcgeek11

Double clicking on a email attatchment and launching a program by mistake isn't user stupidity.. it's a severe design flaw.

Same thing with having files that are executable by naming them cool.jpg.exe

Design flaw.

you mean, scripts shouldn't be executable without setting them such? And that 3 digit extension is just a bother, please hide it!

 

[kamper]

Originally posted by: ForumMaster
... but also a more secure kernel design.

Could you back that one up please?

 

[drag]

Originally posted by: kamper

Originally posted by: ForumMaster
... but also a more secure kernel design.

Could you back that one up please?

I figure he means that it's a 'microkernel'... Which it isn't. It's not at all.
I uses code FROM a Microkernel, but it doesn't use it AS a Microkernel.

People try to say "Oh it's a hybrid" or whatever that is suppose to mean. Of course if the Apple's XNU kernel is a hybrid microkernel design then so is XP's. The NT kernel incorporates aspects of both monolythic and microkernel aspects, just as much, if not more, then what XNU does.

 

[pcgeek11]

Originally posted by: drag

Originally posted by: pcgeek11

Originally posted by: gwag
Cause this will never happen on a mac, unless of course its a new mac running windows or a mac running virtual PC or maybe a mac running parallels desktop and some form of windows.

This is so phoney and retarded, words escape me. I have been using and working with PC's ( Read this as X86 machines with DOS and Windows ) since 1987 and have never had a virus, worm or any other nasties. I have seen them on others PC's due to user stupidity though.

pcgeek11

Double clicking on a email attatchment and launching a program by mistake isn't user stupidity.. it's a severe design flaw.

Same thing with having files that are executable by naming them cool.jpg.exe

Design flaw.

Ok, Let me rephrase that by changing this:

Stupid = Careless and Reckless Actions which in my opinion equals stupidity.

You could accidently screw up OSX, Linux, Solaris, Unix and .... It has been done many times. Does that mean that they are also flawed by design? By your logic it does.

pcgeek11

 

[nweaver]

Originally posted by: pcgeek11

Originally posted by: drag

Originally posted by: pcgeek11

Originally posted by: gwag
Cause this will never happen on a mac, unless of course its a new mac running windows or a mac running virtual PC or maybe a mac running parallels desktop and some form of windows.

This is so phoney and retarded, words escape me. I have been using and working with PC's ( Read this as X86 machines with DOS and Windows ) since 1987 and have never had a virus, worm or any other nasties. I have seen them on others PC's due to user stupidity though.

pcgeek11

Double clicking on a email attatchment and launching a program by mistake isn't user stupidity.. it's a severe design flaw.

Same thing with having files that are executable by naming them cool.jpg.exe

Design flaw.

Ok, Let me rephrase that by changing this:

Stupid = Careless and Reckless Actions which in my opinion equals stupidity.

You could accidently screw up OSX, Linux, Solaris, Unix and .... It has been done many times. Does that mean that they are also flawed by design? By your logic it does.

pcgeek11

If I send you file.jpg.bat, and you doubleclick it, I know own you


on linux, you have to save the attachment, chmod it to make it executable, and then double click it....why the hell would I try and make a picture file executable before opening it?

 

[Smilin]

By DEFAULT outlook will not let you run an executable attachment. That argument doesn't fly.

People know that using the key to remove the trigger lock from a gun means extra care is required but for some reason disabling this behavior in outlook just doesn't cause them to think twice later when they start clicking away.

Hidden extension or not, even my grandma knows not to open an attachment from an unknown source.

MS, Apple and every Linux distro out there will try as best they can to save users from their own stupidity but there is only so much you can do. XP got left with this "run as an admin mentality" left over from 9x that probably didn't help much I guess...but geez.. trigger lock or no, don't point the gun at your head!

 

[nweaver]

will OE block this?

 

[n0cmonkey]

Originally posted by: Smilin
Hidden extension or not, even my grandma knows not to open an attachment from an unknown source.

Without passing judgement on any product (because they all have bugs):
It's not the unknown sources that are a problem. It's the email worms that get emailed from a friend's account using his name and email address that probably get most people.

And then there's the ever present "preview pane" (or whatever it's called in whatever product you use). A problem in the parser is an autokill. Evil.

 

[Smilin]

Originally posted by: nweaver
will OE block this?

I actually meant OE, not Outlook, my bad.

I believe the current version blocks you from opening attachments altogether unless you change default options. I don't think the very first XP rtm version did this but the behavior got added later. I've not used OE in some time so someone else running it may be able to provide a more definate answer. I just remember the last time I did use it I discovered this (and promptly turned off the feature I'll admit).

 

[nweaver]

Originally posted by: Smilin

Originally posted by: nweaver
will OE block this?

I actually meant OE, not Outlook, my bad.

I believe the current version blocks you from opening attachments altogether unless you change default options. I don't think the very first XP rtm version did this but the behavior got added later. I've not used OE in some time so someone else running it may be able to provide a more definate answer. I just remember the last time I did use it I discovered this (and promptly turned off the feature I'll admit).

so if it blocks all, then everyone is going to disable that feature...and it makes it a pointless feature.


tbh, the whole "hide extension" option is retarded...

 

[Smilin]

Originally posted by: nweaver

Originally posted by: Smilin

Originally posted by: nweaver
will OE block this?

I actually meant OE, not Outlook, my bad.

I believe the current version blocks you from opening attachments altogether unless you change default options. I don't think the very first XP rtm version did this but the behavior got added later. I've not used OE in some time so someone else running it may be able to provide a more definate answer. I just remember the last time I did use it I discovered this (and promptly turned off the feature I'll admit).

so if it blocks all, then everyone is going to disable that feature...and it makes it a pointless feature.


tbh, the whole "hide extension" option is retarded...

Meh. Yea if it blocks everything it would probably get turned off quick. Ok, I just took a peek at my outlook express (not configured with any actual email account but the program is still on my box).

There are two checkboxes enabled by default:
"Do not allow attachments to be saved or opened that could potentially be a virus"
and
"Block images and other external content in HTML e-mail"

I would assume the first doesn't block say a .txt file but would block a .vbs or .exe

So yea it could probably be annoying enough that everyone would turn it off if say a Word doc with macros was blocked. Off the top of my head I'm not sure how else you could design it though. Again there is only so much you can do to prevent user stupidity. If they are smart enough to find the place to clear the checkbox you would think they are smart enough not to open an attachment from gobble-viagra.com or something. The kornikova virus taught us different I guess. "oooh girl pics!" click-click-BAM!!

As for the hidden extensions:
It really only matters for us IT guys. It's the first thing you and I turn off on a system but even most non-IT power users could leave the extensions hidden and it wouldn't bother them at all. It's just a user-friendlyness thing. If I sit down on someone's machine I'll turn it off for myself even if I have no reason to. habit. I guess I agree with you on the hidden extension thing. Not sure I would suggest removing it from Windows altogether though. The first time grandma renames a file she's gonna blow away the extension and render it useless.

 

[drag]

Well this is the problem.

What you'd do is change what happens when you double click.

The problem with this sort of thing is that with a mouse you only have one of two ways to explore a file. Most people are only aware of one.. and that is to doubleclick it. That is the sole way to interact with files. You double click them.

When a person wants to see a file or examine the file the only way is to double click. Buy:
A. Making double click the only usefull way to explore a file
then:
B. Making double clicking on a file (or attatchment) very very dangerous thing to do. (automaticly execute file for instance)
you get:
C. big problems.

At least with Linux desktop, or at least with Gnome, there are built-in sanity checks into the file management system.
When I click on a image Nautilus tries to determine it's actually a jpeg image. If it's something weird like a pdf file with a jpg extension then it will give me a warning and refuse to open it up.

The solution to the attatchment problem with Outlook is to change the default behavior from 'automaticly open' or 'automaticly execute' to 'examine file and provide usefull information to the user'. Like run some simple mime-like heuristics to determine actual file types and such. If you have a virus scanner then of course scan stuff automaticly.

Don't make files automaticly executable. When a user tries to execute a program then only allow it if they excplicetly set the file to be executable.

So instead of 'double click install virus', it's 'double click, get told it's a executable, save it to the desktop, and prompt the user that they are explicetly going to execute it'.

(edit: it doesn't have to be something hugely complicated. What I mean is that it can be instead of 'double click to open', it defaults to 'double click to save to disk' and in the save dialog present the information. Just something quick. Curious people will read that stuff because it's not boilerplate warning message or whatnot, it provides usefull information)

Then it moves from a design flaw to something that makes sense and then if a user is given all the information the OS can intellegently provide without actually running or openning the stupid thing in IE or whatnot then it's the user's fault.

It's just plain instinctive that you double click. You double click everything. Click this, click that.

And also I know that with SP2 and such Microsoft has gone a long way to fixing these UI issues. Stuff like the security context for files and such is usefull.

 

[Jeff7]

Originally posted by: MrChad
:roll:

Don't be obtuse. They're clearly comparing the OS X platform to the Windows XP platform and NOT the underlying hardware (which is nearly identical these days). OS X does get fewer viruses than Windows 2000/XP, mostly due to the fact that Windows' larger market share makes it a bigger target for malicious coders.

BTW, I'm not an Apple/Mac user.

Exactly. It'd be like saying, "Cats get sick more often than California condors." I'd imagine that that's true - since there are millions of cats, and only a few hundred condors, I figure that there would be a lot more cases of sick cats than condors.