As a long time Linux and BSD user I agree with you. You still have to enable basic things that are not turned on by default - i.e. stack protection. A lot of this is enabled by default on OpenBSD.
Black Cube is a private intelligence agency, which is based in London, Paris and Tel Aviv, and is the trading name of BC Strategy Ltd. The company was founded in 2010 by former Israeli intelligence officers Dan Zorella (in Hebrew: דן זורלא) and Avi Yanus (in Hebrew: אבי ינוס). Its employees include former members of Israeli intelligence units, including Aman, Mossad and Shin Bet, as well as legal and financial experts.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Cube
I went through the K&R C book writing out the exercises and notes in a notebook. I had limited access to a computer at the college I was attending. Thankfully I was well beyond my "Intro to UNIX" class and that granted me the free time to play with the code I had written in my notebook. I think learning to code this way can be a huge aid in conceptualizing certain CS / programming topics.
https://vez.mrsk.me/freebsd-defaults.html