the mentioned problem has nothing to do with the current internet. Virus spreading, is about antivirus, but most of all configuring systems right (for example i can configure an windows system to run only allowed software.. but how many admins enforce that?) no they let the users install software, so there they go. The internet itself doesnt need to be more secure, are you able to hack the switches internaly used by your ISP? (no you dont). Depending on the protocols you use, you can be secure thats why there is httpS SSL and VPN, PPTP, card readers etc etc. Your view is that of a user who doesnt understand but somehow kept his own systems alive. My parents running vista without many knowledge of the internet or computers, are just like you. They have even less knowledge about it as you, but that missing gap is resolved by using an operating system without much configuration that does do a good job in keeping itself healty (despite of all the bad media atention, Vista actualy does do a good job on it). The bigest problems of safety are the programs we use, not the groundlayer the internet itself. For example mail is an old protocol, and like desktop computers, it can be setup wrongly, evenworse spam has become almost a war, (where some make milions on erectional disfunctional geeks) and even if they didnt click on pamela then you might recieve fraudster emails. Well SMTP a protocol, is basicly not secure admins can set up however more then only an MX record so it becomes clear if their server is valid or not. Still even if you get that right, people use other mail systems and try to fraud you, or sell you viagra. The problem is while some make good use of the internet other have a more skilled inteligence for using the internet for their win. Despite whatever security one invents, the problem is not all people are nice. Other people will always invent things to miss use the internet. Like non elecontronic communication, be aware of people might f*ck you up. You now for your information, altough your free to love OpenBSD, how about a company that takes hackers, spammer etc to court?, and beyond that improves their operating system automaticaly almost wwekly to be (potentialy) be the most secure system (people like to lower security themselves to run games etc... ... ..) well that company who tries to live in peace with many of you, also wants to be a comercial company. A company isnt even that bad if you think about it, in this world a lot has been comercialy build. And if you work comercialy you can fall back them on them, raise iesues etc, or get their advice, Well no suprice the company i talk about isnt Sun IBM, ASUS, DELL no its good old Microsoft. But your free to use linux or whatever. However if you attack MS with such a lack knowledge i would like to let now the world that there are way better engineers, who design secure systems using Microsoft software, corectly configured, perhaps in combination with a corectly configured Cisco Firewall, or ISA server, or well whatever. The point is stop this blablabla Microsoft when you dont no sh*t about the things you talk about. Get some engineering degree, stop the talking and do some more working.