On Sunday 03 October 2004 4:43 pm, John Andersen wrote:
On Sunday 03 October 2004 09:46 am, Paul W. Abrahams wrote:
So far Linux has not been an attractive target for parasites -- why waste your effort on a system with such a small market share (even though, as we all know, it deserves a far bigger one)?
Aren't
all those spywares system-specific?
Paul, your question seems to suggest you buy into the Microsoft Myth which claims the only reason Microsoft systems are the target of spyware, worms, and viruses is because Windows is "Popular".
Yes, Windows is more popular than Linux. That doesn't mean I'm happy about it.
There are major qualitative and structural differences between Windows and Linux that Microsoft would like to have you believe don't exist.
Sure, Linux is harder to break into. but after all, Linux also has its infamous rootkit. On the principle that better neighborhoods attract a better class of burglers, Linux would attract sufficiently talented hackers if it were in wider use. Linux, with its underlying foundation of old C code, is particularly vulnerable to buffer-overflow attacks. Paul