• realitaetsverlust@piefed.zip
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    1 day ago

    It’s actually not.

    Many laws and insurances require the use of anti-virus software. This is like a leftover from 20 years ago, where anti-virus actually did something. If you have a security breach and the insurance finds out you didn’t have any anti-virus, it’s not going to pay. So, for legal/liability reasons, company do need to install that kind of bullshit, even tho it’s not doing anything today.

    For consumers, this is completely irrelevant, but for companies that want to offer linux as an OS for their employees, that is actually a nice thing to have.

    • qyron@sopuli.xyz
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      1 day ago

      Where is this?

      I’ve worked in office space with computers, handling sensible data, and there wasn’t an anti-virus solution. Ever.

      • realitaetsverlust@piefed.zip
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        1 day ago

        Most insurances I’ve worked with require those. This is not a country thing, but a company thing. My current business insurance requires them

        By law, there is nothing thar REQUIRES it per se, but there is a set of rules and regulations where installing it is one way to fulfil the requirements. Especially NIS2 requires “appropriate cybersecurity risk-management measures”, so having a free anti-virus run on the system is one way to implement it, amongst other measures of course.

        and there wasn’t an anti-virus solution

        I’m not saying every company follows them. I’m just saying if something happens and they discover you’re not following certain regulations, you are in the big shitters and will be very likely held liable.

        Not caring about security is fine as long as nothing happens.

    • Creat@discuss.tchncs.de
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      1 day ago

      Fair point, but the actual use is still nonsensical, even if required by rules of insurance policies. That makes it necessary, not “sensical”.

      • realitaetsverlust@piefed.zip
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        1 day ago

        That makes it necessary, not “sensical”.

        It’s not necessary. You can not install an anti-virus or any kind of security. You can work without it. But if something happens, you will be very likely held liable.

        So it absolutely makes sense to install an anti-virus software if your insurance policy or maybe even your contracts with customers require it. You don’t install the anti-virus to protect from viruses, you install it to comply with the contract. That is very sensical. Not obliging by the rules of a contract is, on the other hand, very non-sensical.

        Every technical person knows hat anti-virus doesn’t do shit. The policies requiring the use of anti-virus software is non-sensical, I agree with that. But installing software you need in order to not get sued if something happens is very very very sensical.

          • realitaetsverlust@piefed.zip
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            1 day ago

            That is completely irrelevant. At the end of the day, microsoft porting windows defender to linux makes sense because there are rules and regulations in place that can be fulfilled by having an anti-virus. That was all I was talking about.

            I absolutely agree that, from a technical standpoint, it’s useless beyond imagination. But that’s not the point when you have to comply with rules.

            • entwine@programming.dev
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              1 day ago

              I don’t disagree with what you’re saying necessarily, but I feel like you’re giving Microsoft too much credit here. There are anti virus solutions on Linux. This isn’t a thing they’re doing because they see an unserved market and a new way to make money. This is a thing they’re doing to get a foot in the door with orgs that are switching away from Microsoft products to Linux (like many EU orgs recently), so they can try and draw them back into a 365 subscription or whatever.

              So, yes, some businesses may need an anti virus solution due to contractual stupid reasons, but that isn’t what makes Defender on Linux “sensible” for anyone except for the Microsoft salesperson.