On Thursday 17 November 2005 18:12, Chris Mauritz wrote:
> Lamar Owen wrote:
> >After reading through the various SELinux threads, I really became quite
> >perturbed. I mean, really quite perturbed.
> If you get perturbed over something so trivial, perhaps it's time to
> re-examine your priorities in life. 8-)
Security is not trivial. Or do you want your server or workstation to become
a zombie in the next cyberattack? What if that attack is against a
government? What if said government is your own and they decide to try you
because you didn't prevent the attack (could happen; saw headlines last week
about open wireless being outlawed somewhere)? What if you are found guilty,
or, in a civil action, found personally liable because you consciously turned
off a security feature that was known to prevent said attack from occurring
(like, for instance, and allow everything outgoing firewall, perhaps).
Security is never trivial.
When I have to explain to an astronomer that that once in a lifetime radio
followup to a gamma ray burst was wiped out because I was too lazy to
properly secure the system, I won't think it was trivial.
The 'security is trivial' mindset is why we have Windows.
> overhead/bloat on a system that doesn't really need it. Building a
> firewall? Building a hardened box that's going to be exposed to the net
> at a datacenter?
Didn't I mention Internet-facing in my post?
--
Lamar Owen
Director of Information Technology
Pisgah Astronomical Research Institute
1 PARI Drive
Rosman, NC 28772
(828)862-5554
www.pari.edu
