From the Dark Side--@Stake Issues Mac OS X 10.2.x Security Warnings.

We first learned of the existence of @Stake when their Chief Technology Officer and the company recently parted ways. This happened immediately after a blue ribbon team of experts, including @Stake's CTO, issued a white paper declaring Windows to be fatally flawed with security issues. @Stake admitted doing lots of business with Microsoft and stated that the white paper did not represent the views of the company. What's next? @Stake issues security flaw warnings for Mac OS X 10.2.x. Sound suspicious? Well @Stake's advisories have included other Mac OS X warnings and a bunch of Windows warnings as well.

Apple's historical OS support model has been to basically obsolete old versions of its operating system after a new version comes out. Still, if the security flaws exist in 10.2.x and the fixes included with Panther can be installed easily in 10.2.x, Apple should consider providing them if doing so doesn't raise significant liability issues for other previous OS versions by breaking Apple's traditional model. On the other hand, we think there are compelling reasons for Mac users to upgrade, where possible, to Mac OS X 10.3 regardless of the security issues.