10.06.09
Microsoft Hotmail Information Leaked, Intellectual Monopolies Now Applied to UK Post Codes
Summary: Microsoft service accidentally discloses information too easily, whereas the UK prevents disclosure of public information
MANY reports out there speak about attempts to address the brute force of botnets using a brute force of human workforce. Just the other day, Cringely explained why it’s bound to fail, but this does not prevent the charade from living on.
Everyone talks about Internet security, but no one does anything about it. That’s not true, of course — there are many organizations and businesses dedicated to keeping the Web safe. Yet it is true that no one is taking ultimate responsibility for policing the Web. No one is willing — or perhaps, able — to say “the buck stops here.” Perhaps that’s as it should be?
A few weeks ago we noted that “Hotmail is currently a mess, which even some fans of Microsoft dislike (Microsoft censors critics of it). Hotmail is also a spam issue and it has security problems.” According to reports even from Microsoft’s circles, login credentials for Hotmail have just been leaked, allegedly after phishing. Under an alternative headline, the BBC puts “posted online” in quotes like it’s a technical term (both myself and a reader called “ThistleWeb” have noticed this independently). It also says: “BBC News has seen a list of more than 10,000 e-mail accounts and passwords which had been posted online.”
What this neglects to say is that phishing too is enabled by malign mail services such as Hotmail. So in a sense, Hotmail is a victim of its own incompetence; it’s cyclic.
ThistleWeb also drew attention to this new report from the BBC, noting: “Whodathunk a postcode would be someone’s “intellectual property”?”
Websites that help people find jobs or hospitals have been hit by legal action threatened by the Royal Mail.
“That could get interesting,” argues Oiaohm. “If someone decided to charge you like 1 cent every time you used a post code, it would stack up.”
The actual revelation is old, but the BBC is very typically left behind. The above helps prove that intellectual monopolies are out of control, even in Europe. The President of the FFII wrote some hours ago: “SAP lobbying for software patents at the US Supreme Court: http://i5.be/MR”
Here’s another couple of Bilski amici indices. █
