Newbie question on permissions

[Chanchao]

On Sat, 2006-04-01 at 21:51 +0100, Daniel Carrera wrote:

> If someone writes a Linux virus (difficult) 

Well.. most viruses these days aren't about destroying files or whole
filesystems, they're about sending email to everyone in your address
book, starting attacks on some site or server on the internet, and of
course spyware/adware which are every bit as big a pest as viruses on
Windows.  Those things don't require root privileges per say.  

Also... I'd like to see the results of a test with 20-30
'regular' (non-Linux-Gods) Ubuntu users and see how many of them would
type their password into a gksudo box when it pops up unexpectedly.  The
ones that do could conceivably be toast.

> or run it from a root terminal, it could destroy your 
> entire system. Otherwise, the most it can destroy is your home.

Hm.. I like my home. :-)  I'd still say that's pretty bad. :-)  (And
even when not my real home where I live, my home folder would hold all
the work I ever did on my computer)  (Yes, backups, etc.)

And not only holds it all the files, it also holds all my settings.. And
all my mail, all my contacts, my pictures...  I'd hate to see something
send random files, emails and pictures to all my email contacts AND Gaim
contacts and so on.  Yikes!!!  I'd say that's bad enough, quite possibly
WORSE than a 'rm -r /usr' because that can be resolved with a simple
reinstall. :)  No long term real life damage..

Cheers,
Chanchao