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On 14/03/06, Tony Sumner <tony@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote: > Is this because virus writers target Windows systems Would this > be different if the majority of the systems in the world ran Linux > and we got targeted? Virus writers target windows for two reasons : first - home desktops are the largest market for botnets, etc. second - windows remains an easy target, with a combination of ill-educated users and insecure design. The reason email worms are such a big deal is because Outlook has been so incredibly insecure, and because windows XP still isn't a real multi-user operating system, a virus run by a normal users client can execute itself with full access to the entire system. Thats pretty different to Linux, Mac OS X, etc where normal users cannot break the entire system, and have restricted access to system resources, not to mention files being executable or not based on permissions rather than filenames. Which is why we haven't seen any outbreak at all, even though the numbers are large enough that statistically, if all things were equal there would have been at least a handful of significant virus outbreaks relative to the thousands you see on windows. A. -- The Mailing List for the Devon & Cornwall LUG Mail majordomo@xxxxxxxxxxxxx with "unsubscribe list" in the message body to unsubscribe. FAQ: www.dcglug.org.uk/linux_adm/list-faq.html