Apple is the Leader in Admitting Software Bugs

By Marcus Yam
published

Apple's grown a lot in the last year... in more areas than just product sales.

Apple is the new leader in reports of software holes and insecurities, according to security company Secunia.

To be fair, the Secunia's method tracks the number of publically reported security flaws, leaving Apple's taking the number one spot to be interpreted in different ways.

For one, Apple's reported flaws could mean that the company is more vigilant than others in reporting and fixing bugs in its software. Of course, the flipside to that is that Apple's software has to have those flaws in the first place, otherwise there'd be nothing to report on. Apple's security flaws don't come primarily from its OS X operating system, but rather mostly stem from software like Safari, QuickTime and iTunes.

Apple took the bug list lead over from Oracle, which held the crown for most reports from 2006 to 2009. Microsoft maintained its ranking at third, as it has over the past three years.

Check out the full PDF report here.

(via Ars Technica.)

Marcus Yam
Marcus Yam
Marcus Yam served as Tom's Hardware News Director during 2008-2014. He entered tech media in the late 90s and fondly remembers the days when an overclocked Celeron 300A and Voodoo2 SLI comprised a gaming rig with the ultimate street cred.
66 Comments Comment from the forums
  • zorky9
    because they are.
    Reply
  • mavanhel
    That's a terrible graph. Who decided to use 3 shades of green!? I can't tell which one is HP and which one is Adobe.
    Reply
  • r0x0r
    Apple's security flaws don't come primarily from its OS X operating system, but rather mostly stem from software like Safari, QuickTime and iTunes.

    Quicktime! That brings back some memories. Not good memories, but memories all the same...

    *Anyone else remember yelling at the monitor and screaming "Why did you become the default media player, WITHOUT MY PERMISSION, for a file that you CAN'T EVEN F**KING PLAY!!!"?
    Reply
  • cheepstuff
    if only they were that vigilant when it comes to hardware bugs...
    Reply
  • If we take the number of bugs found and use that as a metric to estimate the number of bugs NOT found (Say 70% of all bugs remain hidden), then what does that say about the quality of those at the 'top' of the list?

    http://www.johndcook.com/blog/2010/07/13/lincoln-index/
    Reply
  • Simple11
    Their hardware isn't targeted to the 'enthusiast' community ie US. It's targeted to the general public who isn't computer literate and who don't need a quad core CPU or a GOOD dedicated GPU. It's not a bug, but a marketing strategy, and judging by their recent quarter, it's working. Can't blame apple for being smart in 1 category.

    FLAME ON
    Reply
  • marraco
    Suuure

    For example, the cheat iPhone signal bars. Wait! that one don't was a bug. It was a by-design cheat.

    My experience as apply user taughtme that the company excuses away the bugs. Never fix them.
    Their solutions is "don't do that".
    Reply
  • adikos
    mavanhelThat's a terrible graph. Who decided to use 3 shades of green!? I can't tell which one is HP and which one is Adobe.
    i think youre holding the graph wrong
    Reply
  • jaysbob
    I thought apple just called them "features"
    Reply
  • frye
    And what place do they hold in regard to hardware bugs?
    Reply