http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/ Engadget Comments for http://www.engadget.com/media/feedlogo.gif http://www.engadget.com en-us Copyright 2012 Weblogs, Inc. The contents of this feed are available for non-commercial use only. Blogsmith http://www.blogsmith.com/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/
Well, that and the low adoption rate of Vista.

Let the flames begin.]]>Jun 22nd 2007 8:02AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/Jun 22nd 2007 8:26AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/Jun 22nd 2007 9:28AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/Jun 22nd 2007 10:14AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/
If we were to compare apples with apples, and not include software included with Linux which does more than a basic Windows/OS X install, then we'll find the Linux bars shrink dramatically.

Lies, damn lies, and statistics.]]>Jun 22nd 2007 8:11AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/Jun 22nd 2007 9:27AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/
Of course, lets not accuse engaget of using the graph they did just to be sensationalistic? :)]]>Jun 22nd 2007 1:01PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/Jun 25th 2007 9:04AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/Jun 22nd 2007 8:12AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/
First, you could look at the chart and see that, across the board, Vista has had the least amount of vulnerabilities discovered. You could take that and say that a) Vista is the most secure, with the least number of vulnerabilities OR b) Nobody is using Vista, so they're just not finding the vulnerabilities yet.

Or you could look at the chart and notice that XP has the least amount of unfixed vulnerabilities, and low number found. You could use this to say that XP is the most secure - or that MS is spending a lot more time working on XP than Vista.

Or you could look at the chart and notice that although Vista has the lowest number of vulnerabilities found, it also has the lowest fix percentage. So you could assume that either working on Vista is a real pain, and bug fixing is going to be a real problem or that Vista isn't being improved very much right now.

And of course, the chart gives minimal detail on anything, including vulnerability severity, so you an also say that it means nothing at all.

Charts are fun!]]>Jun 22nd 2007 8:34AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/Jun 22nd 2007 10:29AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/Jun 22nd 2007 8:20AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/



News ticker
*flamebait is in full force....man acuses dog of murder...*]]>Jun 22nd 2007 8:21AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/Jun 22nd 2007 8:25AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/
Yep. But can anyone find any non-biased security info? There's no exact benchmark to measure security across OSs, and this graph bears arguing which is more important - MS's ability to patch and safeguard better and faster than Linux, or Linux's ability to not have its vulnerabilities attacked by every hacker on the planet.

The actual virus/attack rate of each system graphed out would be the opposite of what's above - but that isn't any more accurate.]]>Jun 22nd 2007 8:25AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/
Heh. Thanks I needed a laugh this morning. ]]>Jun 22nd 2007 8:30AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/
Which is why that chart still lists ~50% of Vista's bugs as unfixed. Given the low number of bugs (at least according to the chart) that would tell me that Linux builds are quicker to fix these bugs..]]>Jun 22nd 2007 8:48AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/Jun 22nd 2007 8:54AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/Jun 22nd 2007 8:38AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/
Number of active exploits affecting users out in the wild:
XP: 100s of thousands
Vista: 100s of thousands
OS X: 0
Linux (any): 0

Seriously... I was expecting more from Vista. When I look at critical security fixes from Microsoft, and read the accompanying advisory page, it almost always says "IE7, Win XP AND Vista". So where's that added security when most new exploits work on Vista just as well as on XP?]]>Jun 22nd 2007 8:41AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/Jun 22nd 2007 8:50AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/Jun 22nd 2007 1:10PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/Jun 22nd 2007 2:02PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/Jun 22nd 2007 8:51AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/Jun 22nd 2007 8:52AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/Jun 22nd 2007 8:55AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/Jun 22nd 2007 9:20AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/
Allow me to redo the title of this article:
Vista more secure than OS X and Linux?]]>Jun 22nd 2007 8:55AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/
You gotta love ditch efforts to sway user opinion!]]>Jun 22nd 2007 8:58AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/
So I guess this is just a fool's joke, which is exactly what we are if we take this at face value.]]>Jun 22nd 2007 9:01AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/
Shouldn't that disqualify this report and cause the writer to burn in his patched infested activation hell?

In other news:

Budweiser employed beer specialist claims Budweiser is better than Coors or Corona.. White paper forthcoming.]]>Jun 22nd 2007 9:02AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/Apple had to pay some hacker $10,000 because he was able to hack into the all powerful gift from god OSX, there was a contest from Apple daring people to try to hack it. thats why you guys have to pay $500 for an iPhone! lol. I also read a report that said the same thing a few weeks ago. look at safari for pc, it only took hours before someone hacked the piece of garbage. see what happens when apple try's to play with the big boys, they get sent back home with there tails between there legs! lol. don't get me wrong I like apple too, I have a MAC as well as a PC at home. so don't think I'm all PC!! ]]>Jun 22nd 2007 9:12AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/
I'm not quite sure what you're talking about with the iPhone, but I'm not so sure you know either.]]>Jun 22nd 2007 9:36AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/
It was not Apple that offered the reward which was $10,000 (Canadian $s) plus the target MacBook Pro. It was the sponsors of the CanSecWest conference.

The exploit that was utilized to compromise the MacBook Pro was an exploit of a vulnerability in Java that impacts all Java capable browsers, not just Macs. In addition, the contest was won only after the sponsors lowered the bar and a contest referee navigated the MacBook Pro's browser to a pre-configured website and clicked on a link placed there by the hacker. The Java script linked to gained the hacker user level access to the MacBook but not Root. The contest to achieve root level, another MacBook Pro laptop, went unclaimed.

By the way, I do not believe you own a MAC (sic).]]>Jun 25th 2007 4:20AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/Jun 25th 2007 3:21PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/Nov 18th 2007 12:23PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/Jun 22nd 2007 9:14AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/
I mean, how would you compare the security of OS's which have been out for different periods of time? If you only compared TOTAL number of exploits without normalizing for time (as they KIND OF are doing here).

For instance, if you assume that vulnerabilities are found at a linear (or near linear) rate and the that the total number of possible exploits is significantly larger than what has been found, then it makes sense to only compare the first six months (As they did here).

What would be nice though would be a real normalized comparison. Compare for instance RATE OF DISCOVERY normalized against instantaneous number of users or some such.

]]>Jun 22nd 2007 9:17AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/Jun 22nd 2007 11:58AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/
MS just screws around with statistics. Balmer said recently that the Zune had 20 or 25 per cent market share! Adding, as an aside that this was in the hard disk category. Then a few weeks ago, some MS shill wrote that MS had smashed through their sales target of selling a million Zunes in a year - when they hadn't - and still haven't.

John Davis ]]>Jun 22nd 2007 8:36PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/
But like I said, I can't fault a business for doing anything they can get away with to sell their product, I wouldn't invest in one that didn't.

If only Microsoft used attack ads, it seems they are above that.]]>Jun 22nd 2007 9:03PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/Jun 22nd 2007 9:15AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/Jun 22nd 2007 9:17AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/Jun 22nd 2007 10:10AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/Jun 22nd 2007 10:13AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/Jun 22nd 2007 11:23PMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/
And I'm the coolest person in the world.]]>Jun 22nd 2007 9:21AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/Jun 22nd 2007 9:22AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/Jun 22nd 2007 9:26AMhttp://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/http://www.engadget.com/2007/06/22/report-vista-more-secure-than-os-x-and-linux/Jun 22nd 2007 9:46AM