Recently, there was an article that came out that stated that Linux has a higher ratio of spam computers running Linux than Windows. Even though the ratio is higher, to which the ratio is always supposed to be looked at as appose to the total number, there is a reason for this that many people are not bothering to look at.
If we were to look at the actual number of desktops verse servers, the ratio of Linux based desktops would be close to non-existent like the OSX counter part. Security on the desktop in Windows is a joke. Not that it can’t be done. It very well can be done right and made secure enough to never get any piece of malware ever. But, the problem with this is, almost every Windows user knows close to nothing of computer security. They, for the most part, run as administrator and will run just about any unsigned binary just because they want some free piece of software to copy DVDs or to illegally download games and other pieces of commercial-ware. Malware writers know that and they take advantage of this. Now, can this be done in Linux? Sure. But Linux does not have the market share in the desktop market for them to actually gain anything substantial.
One of the articles I read said that one of the reasons why the ratio is higher is because of the fact that many ISPs run Linux mail servers and that will act like a proxy when sending out spam from someones infected Windows desktop. To a point, this makes a bit of sense when explained, but this is the wrong reason.
The real reason why the Linux ratio is higher is because of the server market. Spammers require two things to be considered successful, high bandwidth and high uptime. That is the definition of a Linux server. This is further multiplied because a lot of Linux administrators think that because they are running Linux that they are secured by default. This is one of the biggest reasons why Linux servers are highly attacked and become infected with spam servers.
The original article posted by MessageLabs also hinted that the reason for the higher Linux ratio is because of the ISP mail redirect. So, let us look at this logically.
- Windows makes up the largest number of spammers.
- Linux has a higher ratio as seen in the mail headers by the received field in the mail headers.
- This means that many of the computers behind the Linux email redirects could, in fact, be Windows based.
- This means that the Windows ratio is actually much higher and the Linux ratio is much lower.
- Many of the Linux numbers are actually Linux-based servers and not desktops.
- Email traffic was analyzed but the original sender was not.
- They used desktop market share only.
- Server traffic was included in the article but was not included in the market share.
- This article is flawed.
So, in a nut shell, MessageLabs are posting articles that are bogus.
