In the PWN to OWN contest, which is basically a hacking contest for security purpose, placed Mac OS X, Vista, and Ubuntu 7.10 against each other in a hacking contest. The winner, aka the successful hacker, wins both the laptop he/she hacked, a cash prize, and the transfer of the details of the hack to a security company to give the system better security.
Of course, there are several rules/guidelines. The first day is allows the hackers to use network hacking to break into systems, which has become less common. The second day allows for user interaction, which allows for them to use web-site/email scams to get malicious code to run on the machine, which is when/how the Apple Macbook Air was hacked through a flaw in the Safari web browser in Mac OS 10.5 Leopard. The third day allowed for applications to be installed, not under the support of the system maker, which leaves a bigger security threat to the users (Vista went down due to a flaw in Adobe Flash).
Every system, when connected to a network, can be hacked. Some are just more secure than others…
Guess who’s still standing?
Ubuntu! Congratulations to the Ubuntu community and Canonical!
See this web page for the official results!
