Re: Secure OS's

[paul@thirdaspect.net]

Thanx for the quick response and appologies my the delay in mine.

I now realize that my posting was too vague when I mentioned "secure os's"  I
guess what I mean by a secure os is an os whose packages themselves are secure,
obviously if someone doesn't set up a server securely, it doesn't matter how
secure the packages are.  Like wise, if a person set up a server keeping
security as a priority, all their efforts are for naught if the package is
built insecurely, (like the common buffer overflow).

I know that debian releases security patches that solve many of these issues,
when the come up.  However, this process leads me to believe that the packages
in general are not built with security in mind (which makes sense because most
people programming an editor are probably not terribly concerned about curious
users monkeying around with their programs too much).

How important of an issue do you guys feel this is and do you think projects
like bastille are important towards this effort?  Also,  I do not know of any
other debian compatible security packages and would love to learn more about
them.

thanx

Paul


Quoting Roberto Sanchez <rcsanchez97@yahoo.es>:

> paul@thirdaspect.net wrote:
> > Hey peoples!
> >
> > I have just been wondering about the security of debian verus the other
> "Secure"
> > OS's.  I am refering to OS's like OpenBSD, Immunix, and Adamantix.  I am
> new to
> > this area and I was wondering,
> >
> >    1. What is the difference between more secure OS's and Debian?
> None.  Debian can be as secure or insecure as you make it.
> >    2. What are the security Advanatages of Debian versus more secure OS's?
> Again, it depends on how secure you make your particular configuration.
> >    3. Why doesn't all open source strive to be "more" secure?
> Because security must be balanced with convenience.  The more secure you
> make your system, the less convenient it is for your users.  For a
> better undertsanding, check out the "Securing Debian" manual
> (http://www.debian.org/doc/manuals/securing-debian-howto/) and the
> documentation for Bastille.
> >    4. What are the performance advantages of Debian versus more secure
> OS's?
> Depends on what hardware/tasks you have.  Also depends on whether
> you use optimized packages, or rebuild the basic packages yourself with
> optimizations.
> >
> > Thanx!
> You're welcome,
> >
> > Paul
> -Roberto Sanchez
>