[H-GEN] Legislation to support open source software.

[Robert Brockway]

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On Wed, 17 Sep 2003, Arjen Lentz wrote:

> Those terms focus on the end result, what is important to the customer.
> Open Source may be one means to get there, but it do not preclude
> closed-source software per-se. A closed-source product, say a word
> processor, that utilises open file formats, would be equal.

I think open standards are only half of the argument.  Yes they are very
important but some governments are moving to OSS not so much for this
reason, but for the degree of code auditability allowed.

I have been told the government of Sweden (which has yet to move towards
OSS in any meaningful way afaik) identified foreign closed-source
software as a potential threat to national security.  They were concerned
that if their relationship with the United States soured that they might
find themselves either cut off from security updates or even the subject
of trojans in the code[1].  If they haven't done anything about it, this
doens't necessarily take away from the fact that their initial assessment
was valid.

[1] Conspiracy theorists love this one of course.  I have never heard of
any evidence that anything like this has been introduced into a Microsoft
product however the potential that such a trojan could remain undiscovered
in closed-source s/w is significant.  Even in OSS it would be at as least
as hard to find as a vulnerability IMHO (since there would be an intention
on the part of the coder to obscure it).

Rob

-- 
Robert Brockway B.Sc. email: robert at timetraveller.org, zzbrock at uqconnect.net
Linux counter project ID #16440 (http://counter.li.org)
"The earth is but one country and mankind its citizens" -Baha'u'llah

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