There have been quite a few discussions over the years in comp.risks about military use of M$ OS's for mission critical systems. They've had entire warship systems just stop wowking due to Winblows 'blue screens of death' etc.
The ironic thing is that a LOT of open source software has been developed with direct or indirect DOD funding over the years.
> Microsoft also said open-source software is inherently less secure
> because the code is available for the world to examine for flaws, making
> it possible for hackers or criminals to exploit them. Proprietary
> software, the company argued, is more secure because of its closed
> nature.
This is an outrageous claim that if uttered by a security professional would be a serious ethical breach. What they are advoctating is "security through obscurity", which has been shown again and again (particularly w.r.t. M$'s products!) to be NO security at all. I find it hard to believe -- no, I take that back, I don't find it hard to believe at all...
> "I've never seen a systematic study that showed open source to be more
> secure," said Dorothy Denning, a professor of computer science at
> Georgetown University who specializes in information warfare.
How about a stduy that shows the opposite, Dorothy, hmmm?
> Jonathan Shapiro, who teaches computer science at Johns Hopkins
> University, said: "There is data that when the customer can inspect the
> code the vendor is more responsive. . . . Microsoft is in a very weak
> position to make this argument. Whose software is the largest, most
> consistent source of security flaws? It's Microsoft."
Yes, indeed.
-- no Onan
Fear leads to anger. Anger leads to hate.
Hate leads to using Windows
NT for mission-critical applications.
-- What Yoda *meant* to say (Stolen from a Usent .sig)