Antivirus?

[pumpkins]

Hi,

I've recently built a 2nd computer and have started to delve into the world of Linux. I'm using Red Hat 7. This will ultimately be a gateway/server box. I've recently read some disturbing posts re: viruses. Should I install some antivirus s/w?
Thanx.
dan.lim@bigpond.com :confused:

[Craig McPherson]

There are basically zero viruses that will run on Linux, and viruses are fairly severely castrated unless you run them as root, so antivirus software for Linux would be fairly pointless and is mostly nonexistent. Even more so than ever, safety comes from following one rule: don't be stupid.

Whereas viruses and trojans are your greatest security threat in Windows, in Linux what you really have to worry about most often are having exploitable services open. This can leave you open to worms and other such unpleasantries. However, if you apply security updates as soon as a security hole is found, you'll never be hit.

There ARE anti-virus programs for Linux, but they're aimed more at scanning for Windows viruses: since the Linux machine can't be hit, it's a "safe haven" for the virus scanner software to watch over the network and scan Windows computers for viruses without being in danger of being hit by one itself. Another common task for Linux anti-virus software is to scan e-mail passing through the system for viruses, vbscript attachments, Javascript in message bodies, and filter those things out at the mail server level. Thus, one Linux box can prevent 300 Windows boxes from getting the latest Outlook Express virus.