This report has just been issued compiling the first year’s worth of security vulnerabilities found in Windows Vista, and comparing Windows XP and non-Microsoft OS’s first year vulnerabilities.
The report can be found here but here are a few highlights:-
Metric | Windows Vista (year 1) | Windows XP (year 1) |
Vulnerabilities fixed | 36 | 65 |
Security Updates | 17 | 30 |
Patch Events | 9 | 26 |
Weeks with at least 1 Patch Event | 9 | 25 |
These figures may be merely interesting until you consider the cost saving implications of reduced patches. A customer told me recently that each patch event costs them £30K, so this yr 1 reduction in patches would have delivered a direct £480,000 per annum saving to them running Vista over Windows XP!! Then there’s the incalculable reduction in corporate risk from this reduction in vulnerabilities.
I won’t comment but it’s interesting to note the comparison to non-Microsoft operating systems. It certainly does fly in the face of some of the IT press reports that have surrounded Vista since it’s launch.
Metric | Windows Vista (year 1) | Windows XP (year 1) | Red Hat rhel4ws reduced (year 1) | Ubuntu 6.06 LTS reduced (year 1) | Mac OS X 10.4 (year 1) |
Vulnerabilities fixed | 36 | 65 | 360 | 224 | 116 |
Security Updates | 17 | 30 | 125 | 80 | 17 |
Patch Events | 9 | 26 | 64 | 65 | 17 |
Weeks with at least 1 Patch Event | 9 | 25 | 44 | 39 | 15 |
Not sure about the 30k per patch … I’d like to see more information on that [Rich]
Looking for something else? |
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