On Mon, 2004-04-12 at 20:49, Mike M wrote:
> On Mon, Apr 12, 2004 at 06:54:20PM -0400, Rick DeNatale wrote:
> > This is not at all an argument against open source, just a more
> > sophisticated view of the role of source in security auditing.
> 
> Requesting more clarity here please.  I can't tell what is open or
> closed in your description: the compiler source, the source the compiler
> is compiling, or both, or neither.

<SNIP>

Both are open.

And he shouldn't have presented it as if this were theoretical wanking. 
Ken Thompson actually did this.  

http://www.catb.org/~esr/jargon/html/B/back-door.html

And yup, it's fiendish and really scary.  But I'm not convinced that OSS
is more vulnerable to this than say certain proprietary network hardware
OS's.  (*cough* CISCO *cough*)

CJK

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