Comments on: Number 10, Open Source, and is the site any good?

By: EuroparlTV | Nosemonkey’s EUtopia

EuroparlTV | Nosemonkey’s EUtopia — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 19:00:33 +0000

[...] and 10 Downing Street’s recent move to same free blogging software that runs this site setting us back Â£100k), that’s peanuts. And, though we’ll have to wait and see what the spin is and just how [...]

By: UK Voter

UK Voter — Mon, 25 Aug 2008 10:28:31 +0000

Given the amount of money that the government will have paid to this agency, on behalf of the UK taxpayers, it may have been reasonable to conclude that any design would have been built from the bottom up.

By: No 10 | milo

No 10 | milo — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 19:06:59 +0000

[...] were up like Beta Label As Poor Excuse, 10 Downing Street WordPress Website Knock-off and Rip-off, Open Source, and is the site any good?, as well as some CSS references with no credits or payment included for the original author, [...]

By: Simon Dickson

Simon Dickson — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 08:22:37 +0000

Just to pick up Dizzy’s absolute statement about the WordPress Admin area having a guessable URL. So let’s try these standard WordPress admin URLs:

http://www.number10.gov.uk/wp-login.php
http://www.number10.gov.uk/wp-admin

Not quite that easily accessible, then.

By: Jon

Jon — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 07:57:11 +0000

@finid – I think you have the wrong impression. I *only* use Open Source software for all the political projects I do, you will not find anyone who is more of a fan. The paragraph you highlight is a summary of what the reaction from the press, bloggers etc., will be, not what I want the reaction to be.

Just because something has been programmed for a specific project that does not make it more secure – quite the contrary in fact. Problem is few people seem to see that.

By: finid

finid — Sun, 17 Aug 2008 21:59:39 +0000

“Problem is that youâ€™re damned if you do and damned if you donâ€™t with this – use open source software for a high profile project and everyone has a go at you for not taking security seriously enough. Donâ€™t use open source, you probably donâ€™t get a site thatâ€™s any more secure, and people have a go at you for the cost.”

You are telling your readers, based on the quote above, that open source applications are not secure. Whether intended or not, you are helpiing to spread FUD about open source projects and the open source community. The same was tried by Fortify in a recent report. That report and its bogus conclusions were debunked here

By: Jon

Jon — Sun, 17 Aug 2008 18:31:47 +0000

Fair point… There are ways of installing Wordpress to stop that though – if you have root access to the server where you’re installing it, which I presume they do for the Number 10 site. Unless they are doing that for, let’s say, bargain prices too?

By: dizzy

dizzy — Sun, 17 Aug 2008 08:16:53 +0000

Jon, was not implying HH Wordpress was owned because if an exploit, although the point stands though that a wordpress site does have an admin section that is easily accessible if you know the url string format. I was merely pointing out that if HH got targetted, then the chances are even greater for GB and that Wordpress is a bad choice in that respect