[4922] in cryptography@c2.net mail archive
RE: Could Open Source Software Help Prevent Sabotage? (fwd)
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Michael Cervantes)
Mon Jun 21 15:14:58 1999
From: Michael Cervantes <mcervantes@netspeak.com>
To: "'cryptography@c2.net'" <cryptography@c2.net>
Date: Mon, 21 Jun 1999 15:01:57 -0400
> -----Original Message-----
> From: David Jablon [mailto:dpj@world.std.com]
> Subject: Re: Could Open Source Software Help Prevent Sabotage? (fwd)
>
> Access to "the source code" may also give a false sense of security.
> "The source" might not be the full, complete, and exact code
> used to produce the commonly available object, and thus might not
> reveal the threating features.
Most open source software is distributed in a tar file with just makefiles,
docs, and source. You compile the object directly from the source code that
is provided. However, binary packages are becoming more common as package
management apps like Redhat's RPM become ubiquitous, and it is important
that sys admins recognize the significance of this.
-mike
