MS Outlook Security Question

[gplracer]

I work at a school and our tech guy would rather that most people use Netscape mail. He said that most of the viruses that get in our system come in through MS Outlook Express. I really want to use MS Outlook. We have it on our computers but have not icon for it. There is security that prevents us from adding it. Is this a valid concern? I mean is Outlook really more of a risk than Netscape?

 

[Nothinman]

Definately, nearly every email worm (perhaps every single one) exploits a problem in either Outlook itself or the IE HTML rendering engine, which outlook uses, and then they use the outlook contacts to decide who to send al lthe mail to. None of them are targetted at Netscape, even if Netscape does have any glaring bugs like that.

 

[bsobel]

> Definately, nearly every email worm (perhaps every single one) exploits a problem in either Outlook itself or the IE HTML rendering engine

This is a bit exagerated, the majority of the worms are caused by people who insist on manually launching attachments. You are correct that there have been a number of attacks that directly exploit bugs in Outlook/Outlook Express which have gotten around that requirement.

As for the 'is Outlook really more of a risk than Netscape' question. If your asking if there are more bugs in Outlook vs Netscape, thats something I don't think we know the answer to (you'll get alot of opinions tho). However, attackers often go after whatever is widely deployed (it gives them the biggest bang for their buck as it where), based on that Outlook and Outlook Express are the most targeted/vulnerable.

Bill

 

[Nothinman]

This is a bit exagerated, the majority of the worms are caused by people who insist on manually launching attachments. You are correct that there have been a number of attacks that directly exploit bugs in Outlook/Outlook Express which have gotten around that requirement.

My apologies, I am a little over zealous when it comes to anti-MS security posts. A lot of the problems are stupid people running things they shouldn't be, but there are enough exploits that only require you to read the mail in the preview pane that I wouldn't use it.

If your asking if there are more bugs in Outlook vs Netscape, thats something I don't think we know the answer to (you'll get alot of opinions tho).

Right, the number of bugs is an unknown, but the number of exploits is very well known.

 

[DAM]

Actually the question should not be is Netscape more secure than Outlook, it should how secure are my users?

In my case I have had about 5 major run in with viruses, we all use Outlook 2k, however, ever since those problems came about, I have not had a single outbreak, the fact that my users finally learned or understood the severity of practicing safe email ettiquete has paid off. Your admin is just being lazy and assuming all users are just an outbreak waiting to happen.





dam()

 

[Nothinman]

Your admin is just being lazy and assuming all users are just an outbreak waiting to happen.

Maybe he's not assuming anything and knows it's true.