• free@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    what are people doing w there win PC and tor browser? u ain’t secure/private if ur on windows…anyway…🤷 *Linux gang

    • Car@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      1 year ago

      Don’t let perfect be the enemy of good.

      Windows might not be the ideal privacy solution, but it’s often not something that people can reasonably change.

      It takes work to relearn an operating system. People’s work applications may not function outside of windows. Virtualization and emulation are not perfect.

      • penquin@lemm.ee
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        1 year ago

        Well said. I use Linux on my main desktop PC and Windows on the laptop. I’m the “use the tool that works for you when you need it” type of guy. Windows may not be as private or as secure as Linux, but it sure does have its use cases. And like you said, a lot of people may not have the luxury of changing their os. Linux is not always ideal. For instance, the laptop I have windows on never worked well with Linux. It has always had problems because it has that hybrid Intel/Nvidia graphics. And that shit is an absolute nightmare on Linux. It works flawlessly on windows.

        • ditty@lemm.ee
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          1 year ago

          Totally agree. I have to use Windows at work and I dual boot Windows and Linux on both my home desktop and laptop. Pop_Os! hybrid graphics have been working great on my laptop tho FYI might be worth checking out

          • penquin@lemm.ee
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            1 year ago

            I have tried pop os and loved it. I just didn’t like the battery life on it (on Intel only). Animations were very laggy without running on Nvidia 100% which drains the battery even more. I get very smooth animations and great battery life on windows. I have endeavourOS on my desktop and it’s amazing. Went all out AMD on the PC because fuck Nvidia.

      • azimir@lemmy.ml
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        1 year ago

        This one’s not really new. It’s essentially the basis of the entire FSF manifesto and the purpose behind the GPL in the first place. If you don’t have the source code to your tech, you have no real idea what’s happening to your information while you use it.

        Adding a TOR layer on top of a black box OS might provide some privacy for your network traffic, but the system calls being called by the browser are inherently untrustworthy to begin with.

        Or, to sum up “Proprietary untrustworthy, open source more trustworthy,” which still isn’t as pithy as your quip.

        • zwekihoyy@lemmy.ml
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          1 year ago

          there is little difference between “open source but you need formal education to be able to dig through and understand the documentation and code” and closed source. open source is still better for ethical reasons but for 9/10 users, it’s not reasonable to check the source code and they are losing any potential “security” benefits that was provided.

          • CausticFlames@sopuli.xyz
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            1 year ago

            You are correct for open source projects with only a few maintainers… But with a project as big as linux, there are SO many people with that “formal education” (which doesnt really even need to be formal) that the amount of eyes on the codebase DOES benefit the normies who dont look at it.

            • zwekihoyy@lemmy.ml
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              1 year ago

              I 100% agree, I just think it’s dangerous rhetoric to push because you end up with normies that have been told “open source is more secure” and end up running any script they find on GitHub without having a clue how to audit what it’s actually doing. (this was me 5/6 years ago until I figured out what I was doing).

              this is the same reason I find people claiming that Linux is more secure than windows dangerous. I can exfiltrate data from the average Linux install much easier than windows. you can harden Linux to a much greater degree but if you don’t know how or that you even need to, you are in a much worse position.

              • CausticFlames@sopuli.xyz
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                1 year ago

                I disagree that you are inherently in a worse position simply because you dont know enough to take a peek at the code or harden things. I think that again, simply being such a massive project linux gives a trickle down effect to normal users. Even as a normie, you are safer on linux than on windows, full stop. As for github scripts, thats an entirely different subject because yes, open source CAN be dangerous still (just like proprietary can).

    • Voxel@infosec.exchangeOP
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      1 year ago

      @free Yep, thats why people invest a lot of time which have much more technical understanding than you have to create products to improve the privacy problem on Windows, Privacy isn’t a privilege which only a specific group of human is allowed to have, Privacy is a human right and should be accessable for everyone. If you miss the understanding for that, I would recommend informing yourself better then spreading false information.

        • zwekihoyy@lemmy.ml
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          1 year ago

          you’re conflating security and privacy which are two entirely different subjects.

          • CausticFlames@sopuli.xyz
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            1 year ago

            I love my security resting in the hands of a multibillion dollar corp, so that way when they get hacked I get lumped in! So secure!

            • zwekihoyy@lemmy.ml
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              1 year ago

              who do you think is maintaining a majority of packages of linux? there are plenty of reasons to use Linux over windows, I haven’t touched windows in a good year or two, but it is immensely less secure without significant hardening efforts that aren’t exactly trivial to understand. Windows isn’t great on security either, MacOS is ahead of it and ChromeOS is even farther.

              I will concede, assuming you have the in-depth knowledge required, you can build a more secure platform with Linux due to the ability to compile the kernel with only needed features and being able to fully control what is allowed. out of the box, no custom kernels, basic user experience? Linux sits at the bottom.

            • zwekihoyy@lemmy.ml
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              1 year ago

              not necessarily. you need security for privacy but you don’t need privacy to be secure.

              your data is more secure on windows from malicious 3rd party actors than Linux, but you have lower privacy due to Microsoft’s ridiculously invasive telemetry. The telemetry does not decrease your security though.

              • muntedcrocodile@lemmy.world
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                1 year ago

                I wouldn’t agree the telemetry essentially increases ur attack surface to include all of Microsoft. Sure a Microsoft server might be more secure than something else but they are also a far bigger target

                • zwekihoyy@lemmy.ml
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                  1 year ago

                  I’m sorry but no lmao. Microsoft getting hacked isn’t increasing your risk for exfiltrating local data.

      • jmp242@sopuli.xyz
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        1 year ago

        You’re going to need to specify what Windows and what distro at least. But I would argue that most people’s idea of computer security would include privacy. Not that they get it, but if you asked someone if they feel Facebook posts are secure because others can’t edit them, I think you would get some head scratches and people saying they are available to the world.

  • Isoprenoid@programming.dev
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    1 year ago

    Microsoft: Cool, now we know what communities care about Tor on our OS. Time to pass this info onto the alphabet groups.

  • jet@hackertalks.com
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    1 year ago

    Glad this got cleared up. Surprised there wasn’t a louder more public notice from the Tor group. Despite what people want, windows is a major platform with many tor users.