Gentoo Archives: gentoo-user

From: Mick <michaelkintzios@×××××.com>
To: gentoo-user@l.g.o
Subject: Re: [gentoo-user] Re: Which desktop antivirus?
Date: Sun, 23 Oct 2011 07:50:54
Message-Id: 201110230849.53603.michaelkintzios@gmail.com
In Reply to: Re: [gentoo-user] Re: Which desktop antivirus? by Volker Armin Hemmann
1 On Saturday 22 Oct 2011 22:30:45 Volker Armin Hemmann wrote:
2 > Am Samstag 22 Oktober 2011, 18:14:32 schrieb Nikos Chantziaras:
3 > > On 10/22/2011 05:07 PM, Adam Carter wrote:
4 > > >> there aren't any Linux viruses,
5 > > >
6 > > > Except for the ones listed on the page below, which is probably
7 > > > incomplete. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linux_malware
8 > > >
9 > > > But yeah, on a linux desktop (especially a Gentoo one) you don't need
10 > > > a virus scanner. Yet.
11 > >
12 > > There are literally *millions* of Windows viruses. The Wikipedia page
13 > > just proves Linux has virtually no viruses, and those listed don't even
14 > > work anymore (exploits have been patched long ago.) Most existing Linux
15 > > malware targets servers (like PHP software exploits in forums, wikis,
16 > > etc) and desktop users don't need to worry.
17 > >
18 > > Furthermore, even if there were enough Linux viruses to worry about,
19 > > there isn't a good way of getting infected. On Windows, you download
20 > > random executables from the net. On Gentoo, you install your stuff
21 > > through portage. It's nearly impossible to get infected.
22 >
23 > except when someone puts up or takes over a rsync server and starts
24 > providing malicious ebuilds.
25 >
26 >
27 > Hilarious.
28
29 Isn't that what happened back in 2003/04? I can't recall exactly but there
30 was some discussion where it was suggested that clients should rsync against
31 two different mirrors and diff the portage contents (or hashes thereof?), before
32 accepting the sync result.
33 --
34 Regards,
35 Mick

Attachments

File name MIME type
signature.asc application/pgp-signature

Replies

Subject Author
Re: [gentoo-user] Re: Which desktop antivirus? Florian Philipp <lists@×××××××××××.net>