this post was submitted on 06 Jun 2024
57 points (96.7% liked)
Linux
48328 readers
614 users here now
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Linux is a family of open source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991 by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged in a Linux distribution (or distro for short).
Distributions include the Linux kernel and supporting system software and libraries, many of which are provided by the GNU Project. Many Linux distributions use the word "Linux" in their name, but the Free Software Foundation uses the name GNU/Linux to emphasize the importance of GNU software, causing some controversy.
Rules
- Posts must be relevant to operating systems running the Linux kernel. GNU/Linux or otherwise.
- No misinformation
- No NSFW content
- No hate speech, bigotry, etc
Related Communities
Community icon by Alpár-Etele Méder, licensed under CC BY 3.0
founded 5 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
A lot of drivers for hardware are actually not open source, just unreadable binaries that do ...something. No one knows exactly how they work, so some people consider them a security risk.
I think its because the linux kernel is GPL2, not the modern GPL3 like most free software, so I think thats why some components are allowed to be non-free. Not sure though.
So, that practice violates the spririt of free software. So some distributions have those components removed. Its safer, but you may lose functionality, depending on what computer components you have.
Its an important project, and judging by the other comments here, underappreciated.
You explanation sums it all up thanks.
While I do understand the security aspect of this here at the same time those people seem to be delusional. At some point there's proprietary stuff in our computers, be it a driver, a BIOS or the code that runs on the various microcontrollers that run low level functions from the USB ports to simple power management.
The most "security paranoid" organizations in the world usually run a lot of stuff on Windows and HP hardware full of opaque and proprietary code and they consider it "safe enough".
I may get that not free / license based stuff might raise concerns if you aren't a mega corp. that can pay the fee either way, but... if a trackpad requires a free but closed-source binary driver why would a random guy on the internet consider that to be a risk?
Depending on the vendor providing that trackpad driver it may not be a substantial security risk. But it is a loss of software freedom, which some people care about.
Yeah, sure, but if the largest companies in the world trust the vendor that proprietary firmware why would I not trust it?
I agree with your POV, in theory yes, having stuff you can't inspect it's a risk, in practice there are a few more nuances to that. It's not reasonable to want to have a 100% open-source computer from the software to use down to the AVRs/PICs that run low level functions.