Practical lesson “Freely distributed software products. Legal protection of software products. Free software Licensed and free software

Information Security

The Ministry of Telecom and Mass Communications at the end of December published its views on the introduction of free software (Open Source) in government agencies. The document lists the advantages of free products, the main of which are free and security. But is it really so?

Free is free?

There is a widespread belief that free software is free at the same time. In the document of the Ministry of Telecom and Mass Communications this thesis is used:

Firstly, it is cheap and anti-corruption. Open source software does not require royalties for each installed copy of the software.

However, IT experts, including open source founder Richard Stallman, disagree. Stallman himself repeats the phrase at each of his speeches:

Free means free, but not free. And none of this is equal to Open Source. These are three concepts that should not be confused.

There is no need to look far for examples that confirm this opinion. More recently, Dell has agreed to pay Microsoft royalties for using Android and Chrome OS on its devices. The Redmond-based corporation owns a number of technology patents that are used in open source projects created by Google.

The same Stallman published, in which he called to support the campaign for the "release of Android", that is, for the publication of the source codes of the operating system (and its creator, Google, is not going to do this).

Ultimately, open source software may be free for the end user, but in the case of corporate products and mass installations, things are not so simple. A company can participate in the development of the product it needs and send its fixes to a common repository - or (if during the process of "finalizing" the product, there was a way out of the GNU license), hire its own dedicated development team to support the fork. As you might guess, this path has little to do with being free.

Free software is more secure

Since, as we just found out, free software, free software and open source are three completely different things, it seems that one of them should be more secure than proprietary products. In fact, this is not the case.

The document of the Ministry of Telecom and Mass Communications says that closed products are less secure, since they contain undocumented features:

Many proprietary applications from well-known manufacturers contain undocumented features, which is a potential threat.

But many of the open (free, free) applications also contain undocumented functions. Developers do not always have time (and do not always want) to properly document the capabilities of their project. Moreover, a number of documented functions (for example, or) are also potential threats.

A separate question that needs to be answered is what are "undocumented functions", does a menu item, say, not described in the documentation, fit this definition? If we are talking about "undeclared opportunities", then there must be a process for their declaration. If vulnerabilities are implied, then this is a completely different topic.

In fact, in order to increase the confidence in the safety of the code, it is enough to follow a simple algorithm:

There must be an “extreme” who is responsible for this security (internal or external, for example, a software manufacturer).
The person in charge must receive the appropriate assignment.
It must be provided with the necessary means and tools!
You need to implement secure development (SDL), configuration management and vulnerability management.

In this case, it will not matter at all whether you are working with "free", "free", "paid" or "proprietary" software. The presence of published source codes in some cases makes the process of ensuring security easier (at the same time, we are not talking about free of charge), but this fact does not help (and sometimes even prevents) finding the person responsible. Moreover, total openness makes it useless to ask: "Who wrote this line?"
In the case of the backdoor in RSA, it turned out that the company was paid by the NSA - that is, the culprit was found. But where the Heartbleed vulnerability came from in the SSL package is still unclear.

On the other hand, free software is easier to adapt to changing conditions. Of course, the installation of “closed and non-free” Windows on HMI in ICS systems is an obvious mistake, which has led to the fact that many systems still have not closed the CVE-2010-2568 vulnerability, through which the Stuxnet worm spread. ... Using an "open" system would allow you to develop your own patch, but this also requires a development team that costs money.

Should the state develop Russian Open Source

Another excerpt from the document of the Ministry of Telecom and Mass Communications, which contains the thesis that free software corresponds to national interests:

Fourth, the use of open source software takes into account national interests. Despite the fact that the creation of free software is inseparable from the world community of developers, services for their adaptation, implementation, support and development are provided, as a rule, by national firms, which is more beneficial to the state and society.

It turns out that the "redesign" of Open Source (even in violation of the GPL) is rightly in the interests of the country, but the creation of its own technology from scratch, which for some reason is not open source software, does not meet such interests.

In Russia, there are very few companies like ALT Linux that do everything right and according to the letter of all licenses and laws of open source software. On the whole, the development of a "package of free domestic software" is, perhaps, a bright task, but clearly not a priority.

Here I would like to turn to another popular topic - the creation of a "domestic OS".

No operating system needed!

In the matter of import substitution, it is much more logical to pay attention not to the creation of your own operating systems and office suites, but to completely different areas. You need to start with something that has an ultimate goal, and there should be an opportunity to calculate the effectiveness of this "something". The operating system is clearly not "it".

Desktops

Desktops, despite all their archaism, will remain a serious "devourer" of the IT budget in the corporate sector for a long time with an update cycle of 3-5 years. Considering that a significant part of the corporate sector in Russia is the public sector and related companies, the transfer of this niche to Russian products is quite real - you only need a strong-willed decision.

"Well, here, your Windows!" - the reader will say. Not at all! You need to start making a desktop with a processor. Moreover, we have it, and it's not bad. Yes, we are talking about Elbrus.

Already in the process of working on your own processor, along the way, you will have to solve issues with the creation of operating systems, programming languages and other elements of the ecosystem. In order for software manufacturers to want to write under the conditional "Elbrus", it is necessary that there be demand for such products, and MCST could produce a sufficient amount of iron.

The already mentioned state-owned companies and their satellites can form the backbone of the first users. If software manufacturers (the same ALT Linux, or JetBrains) see prospects and a user base, they will not refuse to create a version for Elbrus (by the way, we are now porting PT Application Firewall to this processor) - at the same time, compatibility with “just Linux” and other platforms will appear.

All to the cloud

The trend towards "moving" many familiar applications to the cloud is undeniable: Excel, Word, and 1C are already there. A private "office" cloud would cover the needs of 90% of desktop users in the corporate sector. At the moment, such products are becoming more and more an ordinary substrate for the "Internet" itself. The most important desktop application is the browser, and creating it is not at all as difficult as the example of Opera or Yandex Browser shows.

It would seem that everyone has moved to Chromium - but there is nothing wrong with that. Taking an existing platform as a basis, adding additional functionality to it and providing a support cycle will create a competitive product. And already in parallel, it will be possible to start creating your own Chromium, if necessary.

Iron Sky

Of course, other components are needed to create your own cloud, and the first problem here is the lack of hardware (the situation is especially sad with server platforms). There is no need to wait for a quick solution in this area, so at the first stages there is nothing wrong with using existing solutions.

With network hardware, the situation is gradually improving, in the field of NAS is doing serious things, one cannot discount and “

Laboratory work

Computer science, cybernetics and programming

Theoretical information for laboratory work Classification of programs by their legal status Programs by their legal status can be divided into three large groups: licensed shareware and free distribution. Licensed programs. In accordance with the license agreement, the developers of the program guarantee its normal functioning in a certain operating system and are responsible for this. Licensed programs are usually sold by developers in boxed distributions.

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It should be said right away about this type of software that the condition of having a license for a certain product is not required. So, for example, both licensed applications and those developed by enthusiasts in their field (semi-professionals, students, etc.) belong to free software.

Thus, among all that is offered today on the market of computer and mobile software, three large categories can be distinguished separately:

open source programs;
freeware applications;
open source software.

Varieties of free software

What programs are called free distribution is already a little clear. But here, too, there are some nuances.

Open source software is not copyrighted from a statutory point of view. In this case, only the fact of alienation of the rights to the product from the author and their assignment to the category of the public domain, when the rights are common property, are indicated. Some of the Internet standards (HTML, TCP / IP, etc.) are prime examples. However, they may or may not be open source. But in any case, such free software for Windows, for example, can be modified, changed, used to develop new software, or simply distribute them without any restrictions.

For the second type of software products, copyright is reserved for the developer, and their use, as a rule, is limited to reduced capabilities, as well as by the terms of non-commercial use. For freeware-programs, as it is already clear, any modification of them without the consent of the author is impossible or even illegal, although you do not need to pay for their use. In addition, the developer, as a rule, constantly monitors the use and distribution of his software product, and in some cases may even transfer it to the status of shareware, which implies a limitation in functionality or free use for a certain period.

Finally, another look at free software. Examples of such software would be incomplete if the issue of open source software was not addressed. What does this mean in the simplest sense? Yes, only that the developer provides users with unlimited rights to launch the application for any purpose, change and modify with the subsequent transfer of its original or modified copy to third parties, etc. its level of freedom of action is much higher than for other freeware products, for which basically the concept of free distribution includes only the ability to create a copy and use it for their own needs.

Criteria and definition of free software

Speaking about what programs are called free distribution, one cannot but touch upon the issue of so-called freedoms, which is regulated by the rules of the General Public License (licenses will be discussed separately).

Back in the 70s of the last century, R. Stallman formulated the basic concepts of freedoms in relation to software products:

"Zero freedom" - the use of software for any purpose without restrictions;
"First freedom" - the ability to study the work of the program and its adaptation to your needs;
"Second freedom" - free distribution of copies of the application;
"Third freedom" - the ability to change or improve the program with subsequent public publication.

As can be seen from the above criteria, for the "first" and "third freedom" one of the prerequisites is the presence of the very open source code, the concept of which, by the way, was introduced a little later by E. Raymond. In general, based on these principles, by and large, only those that meet all four criteria can be called free programs and applications.

Free license types

Apart from the main license, today you can find quite a lot of other legislative acts regulating this area of activity.

However, as a rule, the most widespread and most used free license is the GNU GPL in different versions. In addition, there are also flavors such as MIT and BSD. The main advantage of this software is precisely that it can be used at home, in schools and universities, or in any other organization.

Free Software: Examples

If you start listing all that can be attributed to free software in part or in full, this may take too much time, and you can find a lot of software products themselves.

However, among all that users use most often, various kinds of multimedia, Internet technologies, some computing tools and even entire office suites (Oracle OpenOffice) can be noted. The licensed programs are not open source, but some applications can be easily modified. Even the developers themselves initially consent to the modification of their software products by users in order to improve functionality or fix bugs.

Features of licensed applications

Licensed programs should be separately noted among free software. As stated above, they are protected by copyright and use agreements.

But many of us are faced with such things almost every day. Surely, many have seen that when installing some programs at one of the first stages of the installation, a window appears in which the text is shown and, if you do not check the box next to the line of agreement with all the points, the installation simply will not continue. Unfortunately, the overwhelming majority of users consider this to be pure formality or convention and never read the text itself. But in vain. Many would not hurt to know what it is about.

The license, by the way, implies that this software will work one hundred percent on the hardware or in the configuration declared by the developer, which cannot be said about other free products, no matter how attractive they look.

Some types of paid apps

Finally, let's turn to paid apps. All categories will not be considered. We are interested in the types of shareware and trial shareware.

In most cases, they can be downloaded and installed for free. As a rule, such programs may have full functionality or limited capabilities that can be used for a certain period (usually 30 days). But after that, the application may stop working, since it will either need to be registered as an official copy, or purchased.

With the first case, everything is simple. It is enough just to go through a simple registration on the developer's website, sometimes confirmation via e-mail may be required, but if this is a demo version, you will have to buy the full one. In the second case, you will also have to pay. However, this has never stopped our user (and not only).

Is it possible to bypass the restrictions when using paid programs?

Today, in the computer Internet space, you can find a lot of groups of enthusiasts who are engaged in, to put it mildly, illegal actions - hacking programs. And, from the point of view of international law, all those who install or use such copies can also be classified as cybercriminals (at least, accomplices - that's right).

Therefore, when it is proposed to use someone else's license keys, password generators (KeyGen.exe), patching (Patch.exe) or something like that to bypass registration, you should think a hundred times about the legality of such actions. No, of course, international organizations involved in countering cybercrime will not be able to track all users (they simply do not have enough time and resources for this), but the very fact of using hacked software products is already a direct violation.

Conclusion

Hopefully, many have already understood what programs are called free distribution and what criteria they meet. Among the majority of users, by the way, there is a misconception that free software is less functional than paid software products. Nothing like this. Some licensed and freely distributed programs created by enthusiasts and / or often have open source, sometimes not only are not inferior to the paid counterparts of well-known developers, but even surpass them (the same OpenOffice, which many users consider a much more interesting package than the paid counterpart from Microsoft ).

From free "Free" + software"Software") - software, the license agreement of which does not require any payments to the copyright holder. Free software is usually distributed ready-to-run (no source code) and is proprietary software.

The difference between free software and free software

Free software, unlike free software, can be distributed without source codes and may contain restrictions on commercial use, modification, etc. Free software grants everyone, in addition to the right to use the software, the right to modify and a number of other rights.

Differences between freeware and shareware

Free software, in contrast to shareware, does not imply any developer fees and, accordingly, no additional services, such as improved versions, are assumed.

There is also a method of distributing software, which occupies a middle position between shareware and freeware, when a certain program is released as free, but lightweight, while, unlike most shareware programs, the use of which after the trial period expires is illegal, there are no restrictions here in terms of time of use, the free version does not have, and restrictions are imposed on any "advanced" features of the program, and sometimes its use is also prohibited in cases specifically stipulated in the EULA (most often - for commercial purposes). Such is, for example, the free version of the Micro-Cap program, which can be legally used for an unlimited time, but it has a greatly reduced library of modeled elements, it is prohibited to use it for commercial purposes, and the modeling speed is artificially reduced.

Free and Free Software Naming Problem

Many software texts are written in English, which translates the words “free” and “free” in the same way as free. This creates naming confusion. This is how the term freeware (free software) appeared, and for naming free and open source software - the term

Classification of programs according to their legal status

Programs according to their legal status can be divided into three large groups: licensed, shareware and free distribution.

Licensed programs. In accordance with the license agreement, the developers of the program guarantee its normal functioning in a certain operating system and are responsible for this.

Licensed programs are usually sold by developers in boxed distributions. The box contains CD-disks from which the program is installed on users' computers, and the user's manual for working with the program.

Quite often, developers provide significant discounts when purchasing licenses to use the program on a large number of computers or educational institutions.

Shareware programs. Some software firms offer shareware to users for advertising and marketing purposes. The user is provided with a version of the program with a certain validity period (after the expiration of the specified period of validity, the program stops working if no payment has been made for it) or a version of the program with limited functionality (in case of payment, the user is informed of a code that includes all the functions of the program).

Free software vendors are interested in widespread distribution. These software tools include the following:

Free software. Many manufacturers of software and computer equipment are interested in wide distribution of software free of charge. These software tools include:

· New unfinished (beta) versions of software products (this allows them to be widely tested).

· Software products that are part of fundamentally new technologies (this allows you to conquer the market).

· Add-ons to previously released programs that fix found bugs or expand capabilities.

· Drivers for new or improved drivers for existing devices.

But whichever software you choose, there are general requirements for all groups of software:

· Licensed purity (the use of the software is permissible only within the framework of the license agreement).

· Possibility of consultation and other forms of support.

· Compliance with the characteristics, configuration, class and type of computers, as well as the architecture of the computer technology used.

· Reliability and performance in any of the foreseen operating modes, at least in a Russian-speaking environment.

· Availability of an interface that supports work using the Russian language. English language interface is acceptable for system and tooling software.

· Availability of documentation required for practical application and development of software in Russian.

· Ability to use fonts that support Cyrillic.

The presence of a specification that stipulates all the requirements for hardware and software necessary for the functioning of this software.