this post was submitted on 19 Nov 2023
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Just use trusted repos π
We have GPG for a reason.
Possibly, but Firefox & Chrome based browsers have the same built-in isolation and other security measures as on Windows. Plus you can use Ublock Origins to get rid of malvertisements. If you really wanted, you can also isolate the browser entirely with something like firejail.
Hardend forks like LibreWolf are good too.
Oh, and Wayland also isolates clients from each other too.
I don't think it's that big of a threat as long as you keep some level of common sense.
And if itβs flatpak, it should be contained
Thanks to bubblewrap.
One of the biggest reasons I might want to say goodbye to xfce sooner than later.
I can't make use of most of Waylands' features and improvements, but this kind of isolation is very much worth it anyway.
Xfce does have a w-i-p porting effort to Wayland.
I have confidence that they'll do it right, but looking at its past, it will take a looong while until it's ready
True, but at least development is steady for now. Maybe in a few years.
There are a lot more ways to sneak malware into a system. Especially if some apps aren't being maintained anymore. Linux is definitely safer, but you shouldn't let your guard down
especially if you're a developer. There are a lot of shenanigans going on with malware npm packages that prey on easy typos. I imagine it's the same with other library installers for other languages too
Funny you bring this up because it's exactly what I was thinking of. A million small packages and dependencies and who knows if the repos got hijacked
Okay, what happens if your repo doesn't have a specific software you are looking for? A trusted repo is good, but it won't have everything you might want. This is especially true for new software or less popular software.
Install nix, flatpack, etc. ββ βΏβ β
You audit the code
I don't think that's the correct path. There is a scanner already, called ClamAV, which works well enough.
Virus scanners don't fix the problem though. Android does it better: security by isolation and verification of system components.
The most important part in malware protection is whoever sits in front of the screen. Systems like Android have so many safeguards in place, the only way to get a virus is the user forcing it through themselves, pretty much.
There's already a ton of such exploits. Most servers use Linux and many exploits of corporations this had to go through Linux (though many exploits aren't related to the OS at all -- eg, SQL injection is OS independent). I expect it's more common, though, that attacks on Linux systems are either meant to target servers or were personalized attacks that you're not gonna accidentally download.
On that vein, I also kinda suspect that many people who use Linux may be bigger targets for their employer than their personal PC. Which is actually scary, cause personalized attacks are far harder to defend against. I expect the average Linux user is technically savvy. Not a lot of money in try to do a standard, broad attack on such types (I think most attacks on personal computers are broad attempts that mostly depend on a small fraction of technologically incompetent people falling for simple schemes). But a personalized attack that happens to infiltrate a fortune 500 company? Now that's worth a lot of money. Using Linux won't protect you against those kinda attacks.
I'm surprised it hasn't seen wider workplace adoption.
A call centre I used to work in once scrapped all our Microsoft Office licences and installed OpenOffice on everyone's workstations to cut costs. It was bad for the MI staff because they relied on Excel functionality that OO Calc simply didn't have, but the vast majority of staff could get by on OpenOffice.
My only real criticisms of how they handled this was not giving people any notice, and making us use a shitty webmail app that only booted in Internet Explorer and would sign you out after a minute of inactivity to access our work emails. They could have easily installed and configured Mozilla Thunderbird to give us some quality of life that Outlook once afforded us.
Also this happened a few years after Oracle got their hands on OO, so not using LibreOffice was also questionable.
But still. Think about the shitloads of money you'd save by using Linux in the office.
OSS is a double edged sword. It's great, but the people looking for flaws that are exploitable are more often bad actors than good. At least that's been my experience working in cyber security. Many CVEs that are responsibly disclosed are found to be actively exploited already.
The difference is the timing.
Exploit found in closed source software:
Probably years of usage by intelligence agencies and criminals until someone notices. (with no possible way to know for anyone that there even is a exploit). And even then it might take months for them to fix it.
Exploit found in oss: Depending on the usage of the software several people are looking for security holes and they usually get fixed ASAP. Of course it is possible that there's an exploit nobody finds and a criminal uses, but it is not more likely because he can read the code. If your code must be secret to be secure your code is anything but secure
Yes, because "security through obscurity is not security".
Also there is no incentive for companies to fix an exploit quickly. They will only release the fix with some scheduled update anyway or else people might notice that there was something worth fixing and that's bad for your stock price.