&gt;Could something like Xen be more secure than the Linux kernel? Maybe. That&#x27;s a good question, and one I haven&#x27;t seen the answer to.<p>It ought to be, because the attack surface is zillions of times smaller (x86 spec vs all the system calls offered by linux).<p>&gt;you always have Linux in addition. You generally use its drivers for the real hardware. It would seem that Linux + hypervisor is less secure than Linux alone<p>Doesn&#x27;t have to be Linux - but even if it is, users have no way to exploit most Linux vulnerabilities because the hypervisor (hopefully) doesn&#x27;t make most possible system calls.