Open Source Repercussions
Software which is deliberately released as open source once experienced a security debacle in the late 1980s; for example, the Morris worm of 1988 spread through some obscure — though widely visible to those who looked — vulnerabilities. An argument sometimes used against open-source security is that developers tend to be less enthusiastic about performing deep reviews as they are about contributing new code. Such work is sometimes seen as less interesting and less appreciated by peers, especially if an analysis, however diligent and time-consuming, does not turn up much of interest. Combined with the fact that open-source is dominated by a culture of volunteering, the argument goes, security sometimes receives less thorough treatment than it might in an environment in which security reviews were part of someone's job description.
On the other hand, just because there is not an immediate financial incentive to patch a product, does not mean there is not any incentive to patch a product. Further, if the patch is that significant to the user, having the source code, the user can technically patch the problem themselves. These arguments are hard to prove. However, research indicates that open-source software does have a higher flaw discovery, quicker flaw discovery, and quicker turn around on patches. For example, one study reports that Linux source code has 0.17 bugs per 1000 lines of code while non-Open-Source commercial software generally scores 20-30 bugs per 1000 lines.
Read more about this topic: Security Through Obscurity
Famous quotes containing the words open and/or source:
““What we know, is a point to what we do not know.” Open any recent journal of science, and weigh the problems suggested concerning Light, Heat, Electricity, Magnetism, Physiology, Geology, and judge whether the interest of natural science is likely to be soon exhausted.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“As soon as man began considering himself the source of the highest meaning in the world and the measure of everything, the world began to lose its human dimension, and man began to lose control of it.”
—Václav Havel (b. 1936)