Torvalds: Fed up with the 'security circus'
By Ellen Messmer ,
Network World , 08/14/2008
Linus Torvalds, creator of the Linux kernel, says he's fed up with what he sees as a "security circus" surrounding software vulnerabilities and how they're hyped by security people.
(( ...snip... ))
Never one to mince words, Torvalds also lobbed a verbal charge at the OpenBSD community:
"I think the OpenBSD crowd is a bunch of masturbating monkeys, in that they make such a big deal about concentrating on security to the point where they pretty much admit that nothing else matters to them."
This week Torvalds -- who says the only person involved in the OpenBSD community with whom he talked to about the "monkeys" barb found it funny -- acknowledges others probably found it offensive.
Via e-mail, he also explains why he finds security people to be so anathema.
Too often, so-called "security" is split into two camps: one that believes in nondisclosure of problems by hiding knowledge until a bug is fixed, and one that "revels in exposing vendor security holes because they see that as just another proof that the vendors are corrupt and crap, which admittedly mostly are," Torvalds states.
Torvalds went on to say he views both camps as "crazy." ....
((
more ))