RE: [gentoo-user] antivirus

["Bob Young" <BYoung@nucoretech.com>]

-----Original Message-----
From: John Jolet [mailto:john@jolet.net]
Sent: Wednesday, March 08, 2006 12:36 PM
To: gentoo-user@lists.gentoo.org
Subject: Re: [gentoo-user] antivirus

>
> In short if a user is getting infected a lot using Windows,
> switching to
> Linux is not curing the root cause. The basic problem is the user
> needs to
> understand what s/he is doing that's allowing malicious code to
> execute on
> their system and stop doing it. In the vast majority of Windows cases,
> simply *not* routinely logging on with admin privileges would
> probably stop
> 99% plus of the infections.


that's an interesting comment....windows xp is the first version that
even gives you that option.  and most of the games my kids play on
the computer simply won't run unless you have admin rights.


I agree that the default of not creating a non admin account is a bad
choice, but be that as it may, it's still true that not routinely logging on
with admin rights will stop the vast vast majority of malware dead in it's
tracks. If someone chooses to routinely log on with admin rights after they
know it's dangerous, but do so just because it's the default, then I would
have to question whether or not they are honestly interested in keping the
system clean, or whether there is some other agenda being catered to.

As to <insert App Name here> not running without Admin rights, most of those
cases can be taken care of with RunAs. It's better to run a single App with
Admin privledges rather than have all apps including email and browsers
running with Admin rights.

Regards,
Bob Young


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