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Comment by oDot | Hacker News Reader

Aren't the popular Linux distros, with default configuration, much less secure than the other OS like macOS, Windows and surely Android and iOS?

I thought this was the working assumption.

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I would be interested in knowing which threat model we'd be considering to draw this conclusion.

No, popular Linux distros, with default configuration, is considerably more secure than Windows, and probably more secure than MacOS. This is universally accepted and basic infosec ken. You thought very wrong, fix your ken.

Don't the others OS have varying levels of app sandboxing while Linux has basically none?

'app sandboxing' is one part, of a small part, of a subsection of a general thread model, why would you pick that when you talk about 'secure'? And LOL no, Linux has SELinux, apparmor, firejail, flatpak, snap, docker, lxc, and various hypervisors for 'app sandboxing', Linux does not have 'basically none', it has arguably to many.

Still talking about default config here

AFAIK the default config on Windows to install a program is still downloading an executable installer on Windows.

On Linux, the default config is you install most programs from the "trusted" distribution's repositories. Flatpaks and Snaps are increasingly used for apps that are not in the repository. They are not perfect, but they are improving.

I don't know how it works for macOS. You'd download a program image but I don't know what the program can do and if there's a sandbox.

Interesting. I believe the opposite, especially with respect to Windows.

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