For example, it’s likely that the proportion of PC users with full-disk encryption is much greater on both Windows and OS X than on any Linux-based system — because on Windows and OS X it’s available from the system settings, and you can convert after installation, which you can’t with the Linux equivalent.
I'm not going to get into a protracted argument with you about this because it's ridiculous. Just because encryption is more available to Windows and OSX users does not mean they're more likely to use encryption. I'd argue that Linux users are more likely to go out of their way, if they have to, to perform full-disk encryption simply because they're already more educated than the average OS user about software, hardware and security in general.
That you can “examine the source code of every last trifling little bit of software” doesn’t matter if, within reasonable time, no-one actually does.
I'd rather the source code be open with the ability for us to examine it than for it to be closed with no hope of that whatsoever from the day it's first published on. Apologia such as yours (and even Matthew's, which really surprises me considering the flavor of this blog over the years has been much more FOSS-friendly) in favor of closed-source software? Does not impress me.
Power management, mobile and firmware developer on Linux. Security developer at Aurora. Ex-biologist. mjg59 on Twitter. Content here should not be interpreted as the opinion of my employer. Also on Mastodon.
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Re: Open source is not a panacea
Date: 2014-09-25 09:11 pm (UTC)I'm not going to get into a protracted argument with you about this because it's ridiculous. Just because encryption is more available to Windows and OSX users does not mean they're more likely to use encryption. I'd argue that Linux users are more likely to go out of their way, if they have to, to perform full-disk encryption simply because they're already more educated than the average OS user about software, hardware and security in general.
That you can “examine the source code of every last trifling little bit of software” doesn’t matter if, within reasonable time, no-one actually does.
I'd rather the source code be open with the ability for us to examine it than for it to be closed with no hope of that whatsoever from the day it's first published on. Apologia such as yours (and even Matthew's, which really surprises me considering the flavor of this blog over the years has been much more FOSS-friendly) in favor of closed-source software? Does not impress me.