Kaspersky Making it's Anti-Virus Solution Free for all .

[Akolyte]

I think as far as proficiency in security goes, Kaspersky is one of the best companies out there.  But they've also been held to a couple scandals.  Not really screwing over the customers but attacking other companies and blocking NSA tools.  There is my suspicions that Eugene Kaspersky is associating his company with the KGB.  He used to work for the KGB when he was younger I believe as a cryptographer.  So he has some affiliation already previously.  

 

So while I think this is great, it's also important to know that Kaspersky's consumer product has downgraded slightly in performance over the past 5 years in my opinion and I think this is a good move for consumers because it's still a fantastic product.  

 

However, any libre freedom-fighters: don't use this product.  

[mr moose]

7 hours ago, LAwLz said:

Sure, if you dismiss the entire phone category then no I do not have any evidence. I don't think it is fair to dismiss evidence like that though for arbitrary reasons. Should I dismiss all Windows laptops because "well, I think only custom built machines should count"?

It's very easy to manipulate market shares if you start excluding some categories.

 

 

Do you have a source on how often routers runs a proprietary OS? I only have anecdotal evidence to go by here but I'd say about 80% of all router models I have looked at runs a GNU/Linux based distro.

 

Whether or not a switch needs an OS or not depends on where you draw the line between OS and firmware. The fact of the matter is that it needs some software to work, and that software is often based on Linux. Again, I sadly don't have any statistics for this since nobody has compiled that, but if you just go to a networking equipment manufacturer website you will find that even a lot of basic products runs Linux.

Here is a powerline kit from TL-Link that runs Linux for example. They have a link for their GPL code on the product page so it is easy to just download and check it out for yourself if you for some reason don't believe me. I don't have the kit so I can't check, but since there are no download links my guess is that the firmware/OS is saved on a ROM just like in unmanaged switches.

 

And yes you're right, Playstation runs BSD, not GNU/Linux. I probably got confused because of people flashing them like you said.

 

 

Two major keywords you missed in those graphs.

The first is for on-premise servers (not all servers) and since AD is so popular it is not a surprise that Windows is dominant there.

The second graph is for Azure servers, which is Microsoft's cloud service. It really should not come as a surprise that Microsoft's service which did not even support GNU/Linux until fairly recently has a bigger amount of Windows servers. Especially not when they are also pushing Azure AD very aggressively.

 

It's very hard to measure how many servers runs an OS (same IP can be multiple machines, and several IPs can be one machine) but W3Techs puts GNU/Linux at 35.9% and Windows at 32.3%.

W3Cook however put it at 96.6% GNU/Linux and 1.7% Windows. So things varies a lot depending on what you are looking at. I do however think only looking at on-premise or only at Azure servers is a very bad idea because that ends up excluding the vast majority of servers. For example you end up excluding all data centers except Microsofts, and I shouldn't have to tell you why that will skew the results.

My understanding  (right wrong or indiferent) is that nearly all website servers are linux, most firewalls, proxy servers etc are mostly Linux, while database and domain controller etc are predominantly windows. 

 

But as you say, it depends on who is calculating and what they determine a server is. 

[LAwLz]

Just now, mr moose said:

My understanding  (right wrong or indiferent) is that nearly all website servers are linux, most firewalls, proxy servers etc are mostly Linux, while database and domain controller etc are predominantly windows. 

 

But as you say, it depends on who is calculating and what they determine a server is. 

Not sure about databases, but yeah that sounds about right to me. Throw in BSD-based distros in a few of the GNU/Linux categories too.

You can throw in super computers and rendering farms into the GNU/Linux portion as well.

 

Anyway, my point was that the whole "GNU/Linux doesn't get attacked because barely anyone uses it" argument doesn't hold up as soon as you start looking at all the non-PCs that runs GNU/Linux. Especially not if you also include smartphones (which I really see not reason why you'd exclude when talking about GNU/Linux market share outside of PCs).

[mr moose]

12 minutes ago, LAwLz said:

Not sure about databases,

 

My experience mainly is dept. of education and small corporate, who use windows server for nearly all database, domain control etc.   Point of sales and accounting is nearly all windows based too along with the banks back end.  But at the point it really is beyond my experience bar a few friends who work in the industry.    

[Sors]

On 26/7/2017 at 7:11 PM, Droidbot said:

Why bloat your system with shitty AV like this when you can use Common Sense Pro 2017

 

With the latest batch of ransomewares you don't need to do anything to get infected,  as long as you are connected to the internet you are at risk,  the new virus ping random IP addresses, and if a machine answers a ping, they move to infect it.

 

You don't need to open a file, or visit a site, or run anything, just by being connected you can get infected.

[Droidbot]

19 minutes ago, Sors said:

With the latest batch of ransomewares you don't need to do anything to get infected,  as long as you are connected to the internet you are at risk,  the new virus ping random IP addresses, and if a machine answers a ping, they move to infect it.

 

You don't need to open a file, or visit a site, or run anything, just by being connected you can get infected.

Too bad the exploit was patched two months earlier before the WannaCry breakout.

Common Sense Pro 2017 users should keep automatic updates on to prevent this, as recommended by everybody everywhere because Automatic updates are good.

[Sors]

Just now, Droidbot said:

Too bad the exploit was patched two months earlier before the WannaCry breakout.

Common Sense Pro 2017 users should keep automatic updates on to prevent this, as recommended by everybody everywhere because Automatic updates are good.

That was just an example, I see many people thinking that being cautious is enough to not get a virus, and the truth is those days are gone.  You are a potential victim of any new vulnerability that is find by hackers.

[DeScruff]

1 hour ago, Droidbot said:

Too bad the exploit was patched two months earlier before the WannaCry breakout.

Common Sense Pro 2017 users should keep automatic updates on to prevent this, as recommended by everybody everywhere because Automatic updates are good.

Thats just one kinda virus. There will be more that attempt the same concept, but will use some other kinda exploit.
Common Sense Pro 20XX, at some point will fail and be as useful as those AOL disks.

[Droidbot]

1 hour ago, Sors said:

That was just an example, I see many people thinking that being cautious is enough to not get a virus, and the truth is those days are gone.  You are a potential victim of any new vulnerability that is find by hackers.

 

5 minutes ago, Sypran said:

Thats just one kinda virus. There will be more that attempt the same concept, but will use some other kinda exploit.
Common Sense Pro 20XX, at some point will fail and be as useful as those AOL disks.

And yet nothing of that scale has appeared in 2 months since. 

 

Every system has exploits. But antivirus won't do anything against these threats until they are discovered. It's like buying a security system for the front door and then having the attackers come in through the fucking skylight

[Jito463]

1 hour ago, Droidbot said:

Every system has exploits. But antivirus won't do anything against these threats until they are discovered.

That's where heuristics comes in.  Will it catch everything?  Nope.  There's no way any software can hope to catch every possible variant of every virus.  That's why common sense should be our first and foremost weapon against viruses.  It doesn't mean an AV is worthless, though.  I've said it before, and I'll say it again, security is all about layers.  AV is just one more layer of protection.

[RexinOridle]

Antivirus is the biggest legal virus.

[xAcid9]

anyway to download the offline/standalone installer?

[Tech_Dreamer]

6 hours ago, xAcid9 said:

anyway to download the offline/standalone installer?

not sure if there is one , presuming they are keeping it that way to restrict installations on specific regions , unless setup files are compiled by some 3rd party & dumped on some freebie sites , but i wouldn't trust those.