Very Computer

Hi everybody,
I have been told that Unix is much more secure than WindowsNT 4.0 and
Windows2000. But I don't know exactly about this issue. Please give a
comparision about them, and tell me what was upgraded for security
function to Windows2000 compared with windowsNT 4.0.
thanks for any help.
Ha le

Sent via Deja.com http://www.deja.com/
Before you buy.

[Posted and mailed]

Quote:> Hi everybody,
> I have been told that Unix is much more secure than WindowsNT 4.0 and
> Windows2000.

Such sweeping generalizations are seldom entirely correct. In the case
of this one, it really depends on how many and what servers each OS
runs. You can configure a pair of systems such that the Windows NT
system is much more -- or much less -- secure than the Unix system.
There may also be vulnerabilities in the respective OSs' kernels. I'm
not sure what's present in the NT kernels, but I know there have been
vulnerabilities found and patched in the Linux kernel. For the most
part, if you run the latest kernel for any OS, it won't have any KNOWN
vulnerabilities, unless they're pretty recent or the vendor has been
lax about providing fixes.

Quote:> But I don't know exactly about this issue. Please give a
> comparision about them, and tell me what was upgraded for security
> function to Windows2000 compared with windowsNT 4.0.

I don't know the details of what's been changed with Win2K, but you may
want to check a few web sites for general information that may be
relevant:

http://www.unix-vs-nt.org/
http://www.cert.org/
http://ciac.llnl.gov/

--

http://www.rodsbooks.com
Author of books on Linux networking & multi-OS configuration

Doesn't w2k have that vbs scripting enabled for stuff like ILOVEYOU?
It also has a lot more ports open by default.

Some Unix O/S are more secure than Windows NT, and certifiably so. Check
out the B level Unix O/Ses (HP, SCO, etc) . Those have mandatory access
controls. For example: if your password file is at TOPSECRET level, and you
login as root at PUBLIC level (say from telnet), you cannot read the file,
even if you are root. You may not even be able to ps other higher security
processes.

Linux doesn't have this stuff yet tho. But most people don't seem to want
it - it can be a hassle not being able to easily copy files around even
though they are yours or you are root. Plus a lot of programs + utilities
may break. Also, I bet this mandatory access stuff is usually imperfectly
implemented - there are always bugs, loopholes, ways around system, etc. So
the benefits vs the inconvenience may not be good enough.

Cheerio,

Link.
****************************



*******************************