full-disclosure - 70 million computers are using Windows 98rightnow

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Message-ID: <3da3d8310607161336r61959bf2j8d05c9db9bad6faf@mail.gmail.com>
Date: Sun Jul 16 21:36:43 2006
From: degeneracypressure at gmail.com (Eliah Kagan)
Subject: 70 million computers are using Windows
	98rightnow

On 7/12/06, Dude VanWinkle wrote:
> and for the record, win9x doesnt have the option for security. no
> ACL's, file system doesnt support them, doesnt that make the idea of
> securing it moot?

Win9x OSes (including Windows ME) are not true multi-user operating
systems. They do not implement separation of priviledge (and they
don't, in any real sense, implement protected memory either, because
the system memory space is open to maintain compatibility with the
Win3.1 way of doing system calls). That does not mean that they are
*insecure*. It means that they are insecure if you allow untrusted
users or execute untrusted code. It also means they carry little
protection against programs that contain vulnerabilities, compared to
operating systems like NT and *nix which do implement those design
features.

It makes sense to patch your Win9x system against vulnerabilities. It
makes sense to lock your house to keep people from stealing your Win9x
system. It is an error to confuse the existence of separation of
priviledge and protected memory with securty. Security is a property
not of an application alone, but of the application and how it is
used.

On the other hand, no company should be expected to support a product
forever (unless they say they're going to). But the suggested
solution--upgrading to Windows XP--is certainly no more than a poor
joke for most boxes that shipped with Windows 98.

-Eliah