
Ask HN: No evidence ever for Windows/iOS source leaks? - goferito
I&#x27;ve seen some talks of elite hackers defending Windows is a more secure OS over open source solutions because malware developers can&#x27;t easily find vulnerabilities if they don&#x27;t have access to the code.<p>I ask myself, has never been found evidence of governments&#x2F;mafias to have copies of Windows&#x2F;iOS source code?
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daddylonglegs
Microsoft shares it's code with quite a few companies and governments:

[https://www.microsoft.com/en-
us/sharedsource/default.aspx](https://www.microsoft.com/en-
us/sharedsource/default.aspx)

[https://www.zdnet.com/article/microsoft-opens-source-code-
to...](https://www.zdnet.com/article/microsoft-opens-source-code-to-russian-
secret-service/)

A lot of Microsoft's code has also been leaked:

[https://www.theregister.co.uk/AMP/2017/06/23/windows_10_leak...](https://www.theregister.co.uk/AMP/2017/06/23/windows_10_leak/)

I don't know what the situation is with iOS. How much is in common with
Darwin?

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robin_reala
Windows 2000 and NT source leaked through a source code availability program:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Interface_Source_Envir...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Interface_Source_Environment)
. If that could happen then absolutely governments would have it.

The iOS kernel is based on Darwin which in macOS form is an open source
project. It’s usually a bit out of date, but is available for download.

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goferito
Then, defending Windows to be more secure for being close source makes no
sense. Thanks!

~~~
daddylonglegs
I agree. I would argue that Microsoft have the worst of all worlds because on
the one hand they share their code with intelligence agencies (including the
FSB!) who seem to me to be inclined towards hoarding vulnerabilities for
attack rather than getting them fixed upstream. On the other hand, much of
their code has been leaked illegally; which makes it available to any and all
black hat hackers but many law-abiding white hats will be constrained in their
possible use of it. So everyone has the code except for the people who might
report bugs/ fixes.

