With increasing amounts of people, organizations, and governments adopting Linux, we’re no longer as safe as we used to be. Unfortunately, we might have to get virus/malware scanners now like Windows users.
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
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.
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.
With increasing amounts of people, organizations, and governments adopting Linux, we’re no longer as safe as we used to be. Unfortunately, we might have to get virus/malware scanners now like Windows users.
Just use trusted repos 👍
We have GPG for a reason.
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
deleted by creator
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. ◉‿◉
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.