p2pnet - rss feed: New year bodes ill for Microsoft
p2pnet.net News:- Bill and the Boyz are already facing an “early crisis of confidence” in Vista’s quality, says the The New York Times.
Actually there’s nothing early about it. New Zealand computer expert Peter Gutmann worked a detailed Vista cost analysis and found it seriously wanting, saying Vista DRM, “could very well constitute the longest suicide note in history“.
Now, “computer security researchers and hackers have begun to find potentially serious flaws in the system that was released to corporate customers late last month,” says the NYT, going on:
“On Dec. 15, a Russian programmer posted a description of a flaw that makes it possible to increase a user’s privileges on all of the company’s recent operating systems, including Vista,” it goes on, “And over the weekend a Silicon Valley computer security firm said it had notified Microsoft that it had also found that flaw, as well as five other vulnerabilities, including one serious error in the software code underlying the company’s new Internet Explorer 7 browser.”
The story quotes computer security company Determina as saying the browser flaw means web users could be hit by malicious software, “simply by visiting a booby-trapped site” which would allow a hacker to, “inject rogue software into the Vista-based computer.
Meanwhile, “Microsoft has spent millions branding the Vista operating system as the most secure product it has produced, and it is counting on Vista to help turn the tide against a wave of software attacks now plaguing Windows-based computers,” says the NYT, adding Determina researchers said they had notified Microsoft of four other flaws, “including a bug that would make it possible for an attacker to repeatedly disable a Microsoft Exchange mail server simply by sending the program an infected e-mail message”.
And last week, “the chief technology officer of Trend Micro, a computer security firm in Tokyo, told several computer news Web sites that he had discovered an offer on an underground computer discussion forum to sell information about a security flaw in Windows Vista for $50,000. Over the weekend a spokesman for Trend Micro said that the company had not obtained the information, and as a result could not confirm the authenticity of the offer.
“Many computer security companies say that there is a lively underground market for information that would permit attackers to break in to systems via the Internet.”
If your Net access is blocked by government restrictions, try Psiphon from the Citizen Lab at the University of Toronto’s Munk Centre for International Studies. Go here for the official download, here for the p2pnet download, and here for details. And if you’re Chinese and you’re looking for a way to access independent Internet news sources, try Freegate, the DIT program written to help Chinese citizens circumvent web site blocking outside of China. Download it here.
Also See:
The New York Times - Flaws Are Detected in Microsoft’s Vista, December 25, 2006
longest suicide note in history - Cost analysis of Vista DRM, December 22, 2006
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