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Security differences between Linux and Windows

Security differences between Linux and Windows

What are the main differences between Linux and Windows (and Unix), in terms of security?

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Security in Windows 2000/XP/2003 is in many ways similar to UNIX; it also has many important differences. Some of them are:

file security is a bit more granular in Windows than in most popular UNIX variants,
Windows security is configured through binary registry while UNIX uses text configuration files in /etc/ (which makes UNIX security configuration much more transparent),
kernel security model is different,
network service security is different, etc.

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This was first published in July 2004

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