Re: Opinion: I was just trying to sell OpenVMS

Dave Froble wrote:
GreyCloud wrote:

So running a VAX under Ultrix or NetBSD would make it automatically "secure" ? Certainly not.
"Security" has a lot more to do with corporate policy
than with the selection of a particular platform.
Put a firewall plus virus scanner between your sensitive systems
and the open internet and you can run whatever platform you like.



But not on any M$ platforms. Anybody that thinks that windows is secure, will indeed be getting a very nasty surprise. M$ windows is insecure and security was never part of the original design. And it shows.


My experience is that with a decent firewall, windoz is actually secure, since there is no path to the computer.

Actually, it more depends on who your ISP is. When I first moved here, there were about three ISPs, and all of them were dial-ups. So I had little choice so picked Century-Tel. Got a virus right off the bat within a 1/2 hour. Hard little virus to remove but I did remove it.

With the previous ISP, they were broadband and a much bigger outfit, I never got a virus.
So, your mileage will vary with your ISP.


Now, if you bring something is, execute anything brought in, and such, all bets are off.

With OE, you don't need to click on anything anymore to start a virus executing. Found that out the hard way.


However, VMS could have the same type of exploits, and if you run with privs, and execute some maleware, it could be just as bad as windoz.

The gobs of such maleware for windoz, and the lack of same for VMS, does cause windoz to be victimized often, and VMS just about never. That specific face is no way is any security.

Current case. Set up NAT router and network in my daughter's house. My granddaughter wants to download music. Not sure about copyrights, but the service (all of them do) required loading and running some of their software. Granddaughter leaves product running, even when not using it. It eats all the bandwidth and nobody else can get to internet. I have no idea what additional maleware has been brought in, backdoors, DRM, and such. Told my daughter that there's no way any such products would ever get on any system on my network. Kids, they know what they want, and have no idea what it's doing.


Quite true. I've seen a few people just hook up their PC directly to the broadband modem and then wonder why their PC is acting wierd.

On bigger setups, like the Seattle hospitals, somebody turned their network of PCs into spambots. Don't know if that can happen to VMS, but I highly doubt that it can happen from the outside.


--
Where are we going?
And why am I in this handbasket?
.

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