>>If the OS is hackable is anything on the computer safe. New MS newsgroups:
>>microsoft.hipcrime
>>microsoft.public.hipcrime
>>Last time they tried to blame it on the DNS server, what will they pick now?
>
>
>IMO, this is one of the big problems with Linux. If you have the source code, it should be easier to hack. Linux fans will say that there will also be more people out there to plug the holes, but your OS will be accessible until those holes are plugged.

Craig,

You misunderstand the Linux paradigm.

Everyone who runs Linux HAS the source code (or can get it freely -GPL)!!!
In fact, you can go to http://www.kernel.org and download the latest version or even the CVS tree, if you wish, and recompile it to suit your own needs. The process is automatic and menu driven in most distros and is amply described.

Now, if I 'hack' my copy (2.2.18) of the kernel source code to do malicious things I still have the problem trying to get my binary version spread across the country. It's NOT like an "I LOVE YOU virus" ;-) No one is going to cause a copy of their malicious binary to install on my PC by emailing it two me, even if it is only about 700KB compressed. Further, no one is going to manually install my kernel binary, no matter what claims or enticements I make about it. What they would ask for, if my claims were that astounding, is my kernel source, which I am required by the GPL to give them. Since it didn't come from a recognized vendor or wasn't download from the kernel.org you can be assured that the source would be examined carefully. Setting on a shelf about 5 feet from me is my copy of the Linux Kernel Commentary. I could easily spot differences between it and the suspect source.

If fact, the Linux kernel is so safe that the NSA is contribuing SOURCE code to the kernel development to enable the code to meet their security standards, or for use in government agencies.

Now, compare that security with what Microsoft demonstrated when hackers from the Russian hacking community, www.hackzone.ru, spent over 6 weeks wandering around the MS intranet, eventually downloading source code on every windows application and even some that are not even announced yet. The Russians now own Microsoft's Family Jewels and you can bet, if you read their manifesto, that they are going to maixmize their use of that knowledge on various capitalist and government sites around the world who are foolish enought to trust their security to obscurity. The Cold War is not over, if you believe them, and they've proved it.