Last year I was on an aircraft watching the IFE, then it froze, I got a kernel panic, then it restarted, I was left looking at a Linux logo then the init output before being thrown back into the IFE interface.

My point is that no general purpose OS is immune from fault. All you can really do is remove or disable things which aren't absolutely needed to get your work done. In this case they should have disabled Windows explorer (which, by the way, is supported) or used one of the specialized cut-down versions of Windows (e.g. Windows Embedded 8).

PS - Although I will readily admit that Microsoft makes it insanely hard to licence Windows Embedded, particularly for SMBs. But Microsoft's licensing is far harder than it needs to be across the board, they have an old-mode mindset where they can charge more if they make the whole process harder.