Windows dominates the desktop market with 90 percent of the market share [1], much of which is still dominated by Windows XP machines. This situation presents an enormous potential for virus and malware spreading, even when these machines are updated with the latest service packs. Meanwhile, about half the world's servers now run Linux or UNIX.

The widespread use of Linux servers, including in large server farms at Google, Facebook, and the like, would suggest that such computers present an attractive target for attacks by malicious software. Interestingly, this is hardly the case. The truth doesn't lie in the system architecture alone, because the security concepts of current Windows versions aren't that different from those of Linux or Unix.

Secure Linux?

With Linux and Unix, as well as in Windows, users have different rights. On UNIX-like systems, users can gain access only to their own files and those for which they're granted explicit rights. Administrative rights are reserved for the root user. Windows, in principle, could use the same concept, but this is virtually impossible to implement, because the system requires administrative rights for almost all activities; otherwise, many programs would not run correctly.

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