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Attacks on servers are of a different nature. No one runs Linux desktop, so it is not a valuable target for trojans or other attacks like that. If it were popu

Attacks on servers are of a different nature. No one runs Linux desktop, so it is not a valuable target for trojans or other attacks like that. If it were popular we'd see just as much malware for linux.

Apocryphon 9y ago
Universities and teams within corporations run Linux desktop, though. Maybe they'd make for specialized targets?
coding123 9y ago
You can't put up a wordpress site with more than 4 plugins selected at random on a linux box that is secure. I even experienced a THEME that was hacked.
- johncolanduoni 9y ago
  That’s more a PHP problem than a Linux problem; a lot of the Wordpress hacks don’t care about compromising your system at large as long as they can just take over your www-data user.
  - skinnymuch 9y ago
    Can't that also be because that's easier to do and already lucrative enough for the hackers? Not the only reason, but a big reason? Add on that a ton of [hacked] wordpresses are in jailed settings.
mwill 9y ago
There is ransomware in the wild for Linux desktop now, iirc propagating through Flash.
- Godel_unicode 9y ago
  The existence of desktop Linux malware is not at issue here.
Sylos 9y ago
Desktop Linux just as well has software repositories, which are similar to app stores, but human beings look over each application that's included. And you find essentially all popular software in this trusted repository. So, this strategy would barely work, as users would only look on the internet for a download, if it's not in this trusted repository and then it's gonna be a really unpopular application. (Theoretically, it's possible for your grandma to go on the internet before checking this trusted repository, but that is really just so much more effort.)
- skinnymuch 9y ago
  Linux user base also has an effect. It's all people who know what they're doing or someone having a newbie relative using it just for browsing the web. If Linux was 90%+ of the market, getting people to download some stuff with a curl command promising some BS or having people download and run sudo would only need to touch a fraction of users to be highly valuable. That's just a random example off the top of my head. And also because I don't use Linux on desktop so I don't fully know how everything works there.
  - TeMPOraL 9y ago
    You're spot on. And if someone thinks regular people would be "too scared" of CLI to pipe curl into sudo sh, remember that people are "too scared" of developer tools in browsers too, and yet Facebook and others have to implement self-XSS protection measures in there, because it turns out there's nothing too complicated in computing when it stands between a person and fulfilling their desire (as promised by a scammer).
    - skinnymuch 9y ago
      Yeah for sure about the "too scared" to do any CLI or any other different sort of thing. I've had some Mac friends just copy paste homebrew stuff in. Without any knowledge of how popular it is or if they are for sure on the correct site. They just knew I said homebrew [cask] is good and installed it. They could've easily gone to a wrong site and gotten screwed over. Half these people are people into gadgets and electronics, but probably will only open terminal once a year on their Macs, if that much.
jcelerier 9y ago
> No one runs Linux desktop roughly 3% of the world internet users. Sure, 3% is not much, but it's still multiple hundred of millions of people
- davidcbc 9y ago
  You're off considerably. The world population is only 7.6 billion, if every single person on the planet used the internet and 3% were using Linux to do so it would barely multiple hundreds of millions (228 million). The actual number of users is closer to 3 billion, so even if your 3% is correct (it isn't) that's not even 100 million. That's also assuming that every user of the internet is a laptop or desktop to access the internet, but that isn't case. More and more people are only using a smartphone or tablet, especially in emerging markets.
  - jcelerier 9y ago
    > so even if your 3% is correct (it isn't) The netmarketshare stats have been hovering around this for a few months, and all the "global internet usage" stats that I could find were closer to 3.75 billions. Even then, assuming 3 billion, it's still 90 million users... that's most than the inhabitants of any country in the european union

Apocryphon 9y ago

Universities and teams within corporations run Linux desktop, though. Maybe they'd make for specialized targets?

coding123 9y ago

You can't put up a wordpress site with more than 4 plugins selected at random on a linux box that is secure. I even experienced a THEME that was hacked.

johncolanduoni 9y ago
That’s more a PHP problem than a Linux problem; a lot of the Wordpress hacks don’t care about compromising your system at large as long as they can just take over your www-data user.
- skinnymuch 9y ago
  Can't that also be because that's easier to do and already lucrative enough for the hackers? Not the only reason, but a big reason? Add on that a ton of [hacked] wordpresses are in jailed settings.

mwill 9y ago

There is ransomware in the wild for Linux desktop now, iirc propagating through Flash.

Godel_unicode 9y ago
The existence of desktop Linux malware is not at issue here.

Sylos 9y ago

Desktop Linux just as well has software repositories, which are similar to app stores, but human beings look over each application that's included. And you find essentially all popular software in this trusted repository. So, this strategy would barely work, as users would only look on the internet for a download, if it's not in this trusted repository and then it's gonna be a really unpopular application. (Theoretically, it's possible for your grandma to go on the internet before checking this trusted repository, but that is really just so much more effort.)

skinnymuch 9y ago
Linux user base also has an effect. It's all people who know what they're doing or someone having a newbie relative using it just for browsing the web. If Linux was 90%+ of the market, getting people to download some stuff with a curl command promising some BS or having people download and run sudo would only need to touch a fraction of users to be highly valuable. That's just a random example off the top of my head. And also because I don't use Linux on desktop so I don't fully know how everything works there.
- TeMPOraL 9y ago
  You're spot on. And if someone thinks regular people would be "too scared" of CLI to pipe curl into sudo sh, remember that people are "too scared" of developer tools in browsers too, and yet Facebook and others have to implement self-XSS protection measures in there, because it turns out there's nothing too complicated in computing when it stands between a person and fulfilling their desire (as promised by a scammer).
  - skinnymuch 9y ago
    Yeah for sure about the "too scared" to do any CLI or any other different sort of thing. I've had some Mac friends just copy paste homebrew stuff in. Without any knowledge of how popular it is or if they are for sure on the correct site. They just knew I said homebrew [cask] is good and installed it. They could've easily gone to a wrong site and gotten screwed over. Half these people are people into gadgets and electronics, but probably will only open terminal once a year on their Macs, if that much.

jcelerier 9y ago

> No one runs Linux desktop roughly 3% of the world internet users. Sure, 3% is not much, but it's still multiple hundred of millions of people

davidcbc 9y ago
You're off considerably. The world population is only 7.6 billion, if every single person on the planet used the internet and 3% were using Linux to do so it would barely multiple hundreds of millions (228 million). The actual number of users is closer to 3 billion, so even if your 3% is correct (it isn't) that's not even 100 million. That's also assuming that every user of the internet is a laptop or desktop to access the internet, but that isn't case. More and more people are only using a smartphone or tablet, especially in emerging markets.
- jcelerier 9y ago
  > so even if your 3% is correct (it isn't) The netmarketshare stats have been hovering around this for a few months, and all the "global internet usage" stats that I could find were closer to 3.75 billions. Even then, assuming 3 billion, it's still 90 million users... that's most than the inhabitants of any country in the european union