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Why are computers not considered secure?

Why are computers not considered secure?

According to Matthew Strebe (Network Security Foundations) this is due to certain trends. These are as follows:

  • New ideas and software are rushed: Developers are constantly trying to add new functionalities to their software while placing security low on their list of priorities.
  • Developers that focus on security are getting overwhelmed by the competition: Security does not get the appreciation it deserves. If it really were, consumers would choose older, yet tried and tested software. Companies like Microsoft who have modified their existing products to run on the Internet have eliminated the competition. Have such companies waited long enough to do so, with security in mind, they would have been beaten by some other company that hasn't given security much thought. Moral of the story: Less secure products arrive first on the market and are more likely to become established.
  • Computer systems and software are evolving way too fast: Computer systems and networks are evolving with an ever increasing rate that makes it impossible for companies to make any predictions on what could possibly go wrong. In addition, protocols that were not designed to be secure, have been modified for purposes and circumstances for which they were not intended.
  • Programmers cannot accurately predict all possible errors: Programmers seldom consider that the state of a program could change due to an external factor as the code is being executed, and as such they test their code using values that they themselves provide. Once the code has gone through the usual checks, it is distributed. However, the code has not been tested using a set of random data. The limited number of programmers that have developed an app, cannot simulate a full set of attacks that a vast amount of hackers are gonna try and run on it.
  • Limited choices available on the software market: The dominance of the Windows and UNIX operating systems on the operating system market has limited the goals of intruders to small variations of two operating systems. When it comes to applications, usually only one or two products occupy a significant share of the market, thus the intruders only have to concentrate on "cracking" one program in order to gain access to a great amount of data.
  • Vendors lack the motive to share information about bugs that are present in their products: In order to avoid any flop, vendors tend to cover up information concerning flaws in their operating systems and, as a side effect, do not promote discussions around the flaws in their products.


Works cited:

Γρηγοράτος, Β. 2008, Ασφάλεια Υπολογιστών και Διαχείριση Πληροφορίας. Αθήνα: Εκδόσεις Γκόνη (Greek)


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