My main worry with Linux becoming more popular is that it will be attacked with more malware and viruses. I wouldn't mind though if Linux programmers could come up with better protection.

[–] Andromxda@lemmy.dbzer0.com 14 points 20 hours ago (2 children)

Most of the Windows malware gets deployed by some user downloading and executing random files they downloaded on the web. Since installing applications on Linux is usually done through some centralized package manager or app store (Flathub), it almost entirely eliminates this attack vector. Running random scripts from the internet by downloading them using curl and piping them into sudo bash is a whole nother issue though. Noob-friendly distros like Ubuntu should IMO have some safeguards in place to block these actions.

[–] pixelscript@lemm.ee 2 points 15 hours ago

Since installing applications on Linux is usually done through some centralized package manager or app store (Flathub), it almost entirely eliminates this attack vector.

xz moment.

Yes, I see that weasel word "almost" in that sentence. I expect it's going to be doing increasingly heavy lifting as Linux becomes a more lucrative target to attack over time.

Your point generally stands, though. Even if they're fallible, at least someone is vetting it at all somewhere in this pipeline.

[–] Vilian@lemmy.ca 1 points 16 hours ago

They have, snaps

[–] pearsaltchocolatebar@discuss.online 49 points 1 day ago (2 children)

Linux is already what a decent chunk of servers run, so I don't really see it increasing malware.

[–] jagged_circle@feddit.nl 7 points 20 hours ago* (last edited 17 hours ago)

Well, servers don't generally run Thunderbird and Firefox

[–] TheGrandNagus@lemmy.world 35 points 1 day ago (1 children)

The insecure parts of Linux is mostly on the DE side opposed to the core OS part that servers use. We absolutely will see more vulnerabilities in the future as Linux grows.

[–] FooBarrington@lemmy.world 12 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

Many developments over the last few years have been for improving those aspects, e.g. Wayland is far more secure than X11 could ever be. There will be more vulnerabilities found, but it won't be as bad as one might fear.

[–] Vilian@lemmy.ca 3 points 16 hours ago

Flatpak too, they could force more filesystem restrictions tho, line Android apps

[–] PanArab@lemm.ee 2 points 19 hours ago* (last edited 18 hours ago) (2 children)

Linux-based OSes are less uniform than Windows. They could and probably will be targeted, but exploits won't spread because of how many verities they are and how different and incompatible they can be. Some, for example, don't even use the GNU utils and userland.

[–] pound_heap@lemm.ee 4 points 16 hours ago

This petition is for developing something dubbed "EU-Linux", so if implemented as is will be pretty uniform

[–] gens@programming.dev 3 points 17 hours ago

That is mostly false. Most of the code that faces the network is the same. As is most of the background running code. Linux is still more secure.