Actually, people who work in the field of security usually assume that the attacker knows the full details of how the system works. "Security through obscurity" is a bad idea. The idea is even if someone knows the entire mechanism or procedure, that they still cannot break it due to its safeguards.
Further, that the code is published means that everyone is free to audit it, including the NSA (which produced its own set of patches for Linux and ended up doing their own Linux distribution and made it freely available).
If the WH were using Windows XP, they would not have the ability to view the source code, and under US law could not decompile it to assure themselves it was working correctly.
Further, that the code is published means that everyone is free to audit it, including the NSA (which produced its own set of patches for Linux and ended up doing their own Linux distribution and made it freely available).
If the WH were using Windows XP, they would not have the ability to view the source code, and under US law could not decompile it to assure themselves it was working correctly.
Your entire post is basically incorrect.
You say "security through obscurity is a bad idea." No it's not, it the basis of the entire "classification" system of the US Government. I know because I have worked there.
You bring up the NSA Linux, but failed to provide the hyperlink. As soon as you provide it, I will use, cut copy and paste right from it and post back on here where it says it is NOT a security solution for Linux.
The White House very well could request to review the source of XP, which they may or may not have done. If I had to guess, and based on some of what I do know about interoperation, they probably already do have at least access to it whether they ever explicitly asked for it or not.