-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- Hash: SHA1 This really more properly belongs on the list, so I'm moving it back.
"michael" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > I'm wondering if we're too relaxed about this. I was only giving the short answer. I'm making the bold assumption that people aren't dumb enough to deliberately defeat security for the sake of convenience as is the default in Windows. > There have been viruses/worms that attack Linux systems (and I > thought the Internet was almost brought down once by a Unix worm!) > as a quick Internet search shows (eg > http://www.virusbtn.com/resources/viruses/slapper.xml). I also think > it's only a matter of time before people turn to Linux to attack (eg > when they realise there's lots of half-configured SMTP boxes waiting > to forward so much spam!). Thus, I think it's before to be safe than > sorry. I think if it were going to happen, it would have already happened, but I see your concern. Rootkitted/trojaned software can hit anybody who runs it, so you need to set permissions defensively against that. After that, if your account gets compromised, it's not taking up any special privleges your account doesn't have, so it might not be able to accomplish it's task at all even though you ran it. > I recall the Apple user saying to me "but there's no such thing as a Mac > virus" as my anti-virus s/ware caught malicious macros in all the Word > files she had just sent... MacOS suffered many of the same security model flaws Windows did until OSX came out. And I'm still not keen that the default user in OS X is root... - -- Paul Johnson [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://ursine.dyndns.org/ -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.2.5 (GNU/Linux) iD8DBQFBmjdDUzgNqloQMwcRAoLGAKCqpWvavKYVitUblKTSQxHvD0E5vgCgzmOd g8m5SYSLbLiPfVFYcoeENSc= =16FD -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
