Friday, July 6, 2007

Security hole in the making?

Everyone knows Apple uses BSD as its base and wraps all manner of inhouse (inbred?) applications around it to create the user experience known as OS X. Ubuntu and friends (Xubuntu, Kubuntu, Edubuntu etc) are all based on debian and uses the 'sudo' application with gay abandon.

Many 'LiveCD`s' use a root account and a root account only. By passing the root versus user setup that Linux distributions and BSD distributions have used since forever. Linspire is another distribution, amongst many others, that uses root for everything. There are many examples of this blatant security breach everywhere.

This deliberate breaking of the dual root/user account setup has the ability to become a clear breach of security. Having a user account with limited ability to break things is one of the major reasons why Linux Distributions have a deserved record of lack of rootkits and spyware, malware etc etc. Sure there are rootkits available out there for Linux distributions but properly secured they are all but useless and this fact is where the run as root could open a whole can of worms.

'Sudo' has its place and used properly has all sorts of advantages but by creating a distribution that breaks away from the normal usage of 'sudo' takes away any advantages that it has when used properly.

Ignoring the advantages of the root versus user accounts by removing the need for a user account is in my opinion, one step closer to the abyss of darkness that is the MS Windows way of doing things with all the rootkits, viri, malware etc that brings with it.

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