The Office of Government Commerce’s report into the viability of using open-source software in the public sector was toned down in its praise of Linux security before release, silicon.com has discovered. A copy of the report, seen by silicon.com with amendments still visible, shows changes were made to the government’s stance on the particular advantages of Linux versus proprietary software regarding security.
Pro-Linux report sexed down by government
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Eugenia Loli
Ex-programmer, ex-editor in chief at OSNews.com, now a visual artist/filmmaker.
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Interesting word choice… I’da preferred to hear something a little less… spintactic?
I think it’s a UK thing…as in the opposite of “sexed up”.
Looking at the changes they site in the article, it worries me that there may be factions in various governments that might be putting politics and contributions from software companies ahead of national security and public wellbeing. It was clearly changed to keep OSS from looking better then proprietary.
What government are we talking about here?
It was clearly changed to keep OSS from looking better then proprietary.
The government stays open to proprietary software but has opened the gates for FOSS. Nothing to see here, move along.
re: Sexed?
> Interesting word choice…
It’s a reference to the controversy surrounding the UK government’s Iraq policy and the BBC. The government published an intelligence dossier to make the case for war against Iraq. (This is the so called September Dossier. The later Dodgy Dossier was subject to another controversy). When interviewed by the BBC’s Today programme, BBC correspondant Andrew Gilligan said that the dossier had been “sexed up,” meaning that, against the advice of intelligence experts, the government had allowed the propaganda purpose of the dossier to influence its content.
Originally, “sexed up” meant that the Iraqi threat had been played up, so I guess that “sexed down” means that the utility of Linux has been played down.
re:where?
> What government are we talking about here?
The UK government: http://management.silicon.com/government/0,39024677,39125359,00.htm
Odd chioce for words, just say toned down, god.
> Odd chioce for words, just say toned down, god.
That would be a waste of an opportunity to have a dig at the government (or perhaps the BBC) and I think that it’s funny. It didn’t seem at all odd to me, but it would have done if I didn’t follow Today, no doubt. It’s difficult for the omniscient Father of the BBC, Iraq and… well, everything to be unaware of these things.
News FLash:Government Adjusts draft copy of document before release. Possibly to reflect the true opinion of the authors.
If you talk about the UK Government, then you surely realize that you cannot believe a word they say.
What worries you is your suspicion that most politicians are not honest? This is of course very close to the truth, that is why we had sexed-up dossiers. How anyone can describe a dossier as anything resembling sexy is an indication of the lack of brain-power that exists today in the Western “so-called” democracies and especially in the Western-Socialist-led countries.
…Al-Qaeda was contributing to open source software. What if the anti-American and anti-Captialists in the open-source movement allowed Al-Qaeda’s code changes into the Linux kernel, KDE, etc… (whatever) and that code found it’s way onto government computer systems.
Does anyone consider this a security risk? I do.
An OGC spokesman said the report had been “made more vanilla” in order to not give people the impression that Linux is “100 per cent secure” and that everyone should switch to open source.
I think this is a fair and valid reasoning. They decided that it wasn’t necessarily accurate as it was written. They are entitled to their conclusions.
Where’s the story again?
and btw I believed “Sexed Around” is common parlance for those who follow world affairs.
> Does anyone consider this a security risk?
Not me.
I don’t see why anybody in the open source movement would sabotage the Linux kernel by inserting bad code from al Qaeda. I don’t see how a few bad apples could make it happen with other people watching.
If it did happen, then Linux would quickly lose its trust and something would spring up in its place. People would stop using the bad version of Linux and al Qaeda would have achieved nothing, except aiding Linux’s rivals. If it was possible, then Microsoft would already be doing it.
I think that the greater danger is from malicious coders putting bad code in proprietary software.
The nature of Open Source means that anyone can inspect the code whenever they like, and compile from source. While it’s possible to hide malicious code even in source, it’s harder and can still be discovered.
The real issue here is the assumption that any government would implement open source code without analysing it first. That’s the implication in the parent post, and one I would be stunned to find true.