The important role #OpenSSL plays in securing the Internet has never been matched by the financial resources devoted to maintaining it.
The open source #cryptographic #software library secures hundreds of thousands of Web servers and many products sold by multi-billion-dollar companies,
but it operates on a shoestring budget.
OpenSSL Software Foundation President Steve Marquess wrote in a blog post last week that OpenSSL typically receives about $2,000 in donations a year
and has just one employee who works full time on the open source code.
Given that, perhaps we shouldn’t be surprised by the existence of #Heartbleed, a security flaw in OpenSSL that can expose user passwords and the private encryption keys needed to protect websites.
OpenSSL’s bare-bones operations are in stark contrast to some other open source projects that receive sponsorship from corporations relying on their code.
Chief among them is probably the #Linux operating system #kernel, which has a foundation with multiple employees and funding from HP, IBM, Red Hat, Intel, Oracle, Google, Cisco, and many other companies.
Workers at some of these firms spend large amounts of their employers’ time writing code for the Linux kernel, benefiting everyone who uses it.
That’s never been the case with OpenSSL, but the Linux Foundation wants to change that.
️The foundation today is announcing a three-year initiative with at least $3.9 million to help under-funded open source projects
️
—with OpenSSL coming first.
Amazon Web Services, Cisco, Dell, Facebook, Fujitsu, Google, IBM, Intel, Microsoft, NetApp, Qualcomm, Rackspace, and VMware have all pledged to commit
at least $100,000 a year for at least three years
to the “#Core #Infrastructure #Initiative,” Linux Foundation Executive Director Jim Zemlin told Ars.
To be clear, the money will go to multiple open source projects
—OpenSSL will get a portion of the funding but likely nowhere close to the entire $3.9 million.
The initiative will identify important open source projects that need help in addition to OpenSSL.
https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2014/04/tech-giants-chastened-by-heartbleed-finally-agree-to-fund-openssl/