Secure Coding mailing list archives
Re: Opinion re an interesting article on Linux security in Linux Journal
From: Ryan Russell <ryan () thievco com>
Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2004 16:06:02 +0000
Kenneth R. van Wyk wrote: I think that we're seeing several of the features that have plagued the security of desktop Windows systems being increasingly incorporated into the desktops of Linux systems. Further, the Linux desktop is truly maturing and, along with that, we're getting closer and closer to a critical mass of users. So why do I feel that this is a Secure Coding issue and not (just) an OS security issue for Full-Disclosure and similar groups to discuss? IMHO, the issues that we're dealing with get straight to the heart of the design of the desktop environments that are being deployed. Sure, Linux has grown up with an arguably better separation of administrative and desktop users from day one, but even just a user-level email worm can be pretty frustrating (in case you haven't noticed from the size of your inbox in the last month or so). What you're getting at is that clueless users want dangerous features, and that some programmers don't understand why it's a bad idea to provide them, and/or they don't have the option to leave them out (boss says they have to be there, etc...) Further, cluesless users will pick the dangerous features if it is at all an option, i.e. if they can pick Lookout for Linux as a MUA, they will. This is from personal experience supporting users, family, etc... that have no understanding of what "happens" to an attachment that they save to disk. If the default directory they save to is not the same default that comes up when they launch Word and do File-Open, they are lost. If/when they ever endup running Linux, their understanding of filesystems is not going to increase. I don't see a lot of room for secure programmers to help out. Sure, they will not write MUAs that have the bad behavior, and the user will pick a bad one. The programmer can write secure helper apps, but all programs that the MUA can invoke have to be secure. The assumes that the MUA doesn't simply let the user launch ELFs or something. Ryan
Current thread:
- Opinion re an interesting article on Linux security in Linux Journal Kenneth R. van Wyk (Mar 09)
- Re: Opinion re an interesting article on Linux security in Linux Journal Richard Moore (Mar 09)
- Re: Opinion re an interesting article on Linux security in Linux Journal Michal Zalewski (Mar 09)
- RE: Opinion re an interesting article on Linux security in Linux Journal Alun Jones (Mar 10)
- Re: Opinion re an interesting article on Linux security in Linux Journal Richard Moore (Mar 10)
- Re: Opinion re an interesting article on Linux security in Linux Journal Michal Zalewski (Mar 09)
- RE: Opinion re an interesting article on Linux security in Linux Journal Michael S Hines (Mar 09)
- Re: Opinion re an interesting article on Linux security in Linux Journal Ryan Russell (Mar 10)
- Re: Opinion re an interesting article on Linux security in Linux Journal ljknews (Mar 10)
- Re: Opinion re an interesting article on Linux security in Linux Journal der Mouse (Mar 10)
- <Possible follow-ups>
- Re: Opinion re an interesting article on Linux security in Linux Journal Bill Cheswick (Mar 10)
- Re: Application Sandboxing, communication limiting, etc. Jared W. Robinson (Mar 10)
- Re: Application Sandboxing, communication limiting, etc. ljknews (Mar 10)
- Re: Re: Application Sandboxing, communication limiting, etc. Jose Nazario (Mar 10)
- Re: Re: Application Sandboxing, communication limiting, etc. Crispin Cowan (Mar 13)
- Re: Re: Application Sandboxing, communication limiting, etc. Jared W. Robinson (Mar 16)
- Re: Application Sandboxing, communication limiting, etc. Jared W. Robinson (Mar 10)
- Re: Re: Application Sandboxing, communication limiting, etc. Crispin Cowan (Mar 14)
- Re: Re: Application Sandboxing, communication limiting, etc. Jared W. Robinson (Mar 16)
- Re: Opinion re an interesting article on Linux security in Linux Journal Richard Moore (Mar 09)