| Wednesday, April 27, 2005 |
16:26 - Longhorn phone home
http://junkyardblog.net/archives/week_2005_04_24.html#004241
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I'm sure this can't mean what it says it means.
According to CNet, Bill Gates also announced a plan to install a 'black box' recorder into Longhorn. When the operating system crashes it will send details to Microsoft. The black box will be built on the Watson error-reporting tool, but will provide Microsoft with much deeper information, and even the contents of documents that were being created.
There's no way Microsoft is that dumb, is it? I mean, it's run by geniuses.
Or are they that convinced that people like the NSA don't have any viable alternatives to Windows that they think they can get away with even proposing something like this? Even if they don't put such a feature into Longhorn, the inevitable security audits that the government will have to perform will be with this tiny persistent rumor of hidden, unannounced corporate back-doors piping up in the backs of their minds. They're going to have to see the code to satisfy themselves. And they won't be able to.
Microsoft (and Intel) have traditionally backed off of previous scandalizing initiatives like this in the past (remember WMP's "Microsoft knows what you watched last summer" ID code thing? Remember the Pentium III with its built-in fingerprint that had everyone so steamed?); but what will become of this? On one hand they're trying to convince everyone that Windows is secure, with schemes like Palladium; and on the other they're trying to convince everyone that Windows is stable and Microsoft is on top of things. Trouble is, while to many these sound like complementary (even indistinguishable) ideals, the big-iron purchasers recognize that they're mutually exclusive.
Via David F.
UPDATE: Oh, and via Bryan Preston, where the above link is from: pure distilled vileness that inspires endless one-liners, most of which are right there on the page. Particularly the post's very title.
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Brian Tiemann
