Bonum Certa Men Certa

Ubuntu and SUSE 'Cloud' Users Spied on Through Microsoft Windows Azure (With NSA Back Doors)

Azure



Summary: Why running GNU/Linux distributions on top of Azure is begging not only to be taxed by Microsoft but also to be under surveillance by Microsoft and the NSA/CIA

OEMs should not preload Windows on PCs because they turn these PCs into spying devices right out of the box (there are NSA back doors in Windows) and no government should ever touch anything from Microsoft anymore (mind this silly promotion), especially knowing how the NSA spies on 'ally' governments. Everything has changes since Snowden put out there evidence to show what many of us already knew for years. Here is a bunch of new Windows back doors for those who believe it's old news (the NSA gets prior notifications about those holes before they are plugged).



"Everything has changes since Snowden put out there evidence to show what many of us already knew for years."A few days ago we got confirmation of Microsoft not only engaging in Skype spying/eavesdropping (in real-time) but also allowing others to do so. It's not a design flaw, it's intentional. Dan Gilmore said, "How can any business even begin to trust Microsoft now?"

When Dr. Glyn Moody, another occasional author who writes for The Guardian found out about NSA book doors, he wrote the article "How Can Any Company Ever Trust Microsoft Again?" This article went viral and also got some translations. It makes similar points to the ones above. Anybody foolish enough to still trust Microsoft is simply deserving of the Darwin Award.

The news about Microsoft-NSA collusion received a lot of press coverage, including some in pro-FOSS sites, even in numerous different languages (I saw over a hundred headlines while researching the subject). This is really hurting Microsoft, which is struggling to spin what it just cannot denied. Not only was Microsoft shown to be colluding with the NSA (PRISM lists Microsoft as the first partner) but it also got caught lying to the public.

"Given what we know, surveillance just ought to be the expectation, not a theory or an hypothesis."At this stage, anybody foolish enough to host anything on Microsoft Azure just simply deserves to be spied on. Given what we know, surveillance just ought to be the expectation, not a theory or an hypothesis. Canonical was stupid enough to end up aiding the criminals when it signed a deal with the devil (Azure). Then again, it's not as though Canonical cherishs users' privacy; it gives Amazon (hence the NSA) some data about users' local searches -- something which even Microsoft is not doing just yet (although other reports which Richard Stallman speaks of say that this has been going on for many years). Knowing that Microsoft uses faux 'encryption' with back doors, expect nothing to be secure. It's just not designed to be secure, it's designed to serve US "national security", which basically means US interests -- whatever they may be.

Given SUSE's financial dependence on Microsoft, it is not surprising to see it being hosted on Microsoft servers with surveillance. Watch this new interview with a SUSE official. Notice how almost the entire interview is about Microsoft and it says:

MS and Linux at Loggerheads is History: Peter Lees, Suse



[...]

SUSE Linux is in a great position of being the only enterprise Linux recommended for Microsoft and VMware.


Microsoft would like tax GNU/Linux through SUSE, with or without Azure in the underlying platform.

Gilmore and Moody are currently being joined by John Dvorak, who explains "Why We Can No Longer Trust Microsoft" (after the NSA revelations). To quote:

If anyone should be mad at the NSA for all the snooping that appears to be going on, it should be the Department of Commerce, not privacy advocates. The recent revelations are not a threat to national security so much as a threat to the national economy. And if I were Microsoft, I'd be having around-the-clock meetings to discuss how to fix what is about to happen.

Microsoft, despite denials, appears to be in bed with the NSA. Apparently all encryption and other methods to keep documents and discussions private are bypassed and accessible by the NSA and whomever it is working with. This means a third party, for whatever reason, can easily access confidential business deals, love letters, government classified memos, merger paperwork, financial transactions, intra-corporate schemes, and everything in between.


Anybody who puts GNU/Linux on top of Azure should not only expect to pay patent tax to Microsoft but should also expect government surveillance on everything. We know that storage servers as a whole, not just routers, have back doors. Free software and GNU/Linux are the way to go, provided there is no proprietary bug in the stack.

Recent Techrights' Posts

Brett Wilson LLP Seem to Have Had Only One Litigation Client in 2025, He Was Previously Charged, Just Like the Serial Strangler From Microsoft (Whom They Now Represent)
Karma is superstition, regulators are not
Project 2030 to Cover How "Project 2025"-Styled Anti-Media Zealots From America Targeted Techrights and Tux Machines
The common denominator is also their attacks on women
Brett Wilson LLP Failed to Meet Deadlines Set by Judge 7 Months Earlier, Tried to Ruin Our Holiday, Then Had the Audacity to Ask Us for Over 3,000 Pounds for Its Own Lateness
As a matter of principle we will never respond to assassin while we are on holiday
Americans Attacking British Sites Only Months After They Leave America
We find it kind of funny if not ironic that this site, originally an American site, got legal harassment only from Americans and only months after it had moved to the UK
Despite Losing Over a Quarter Million Dollars a Year Software in the Public Interest (SPI) Gives Helping Hand to Libreboot
SPI's financial state depends a lot on its public image or its reputation
If You Want to Know the Future, Listen to the Free Software Foundation (FSF) and Andy Farnell
We're sure the FSF will have plenty of its own output
 
Microsoft E.E.E.: Git Will Now (or Very Soon) Fully Depend on Rust, Which is Controlled by Microsoft
Microsoft now makes Git dependent on Rust, or making Git dependent on GitHub, which is proprietary
The Right to Punch People (Apparently)
At Brett Wilson, Brett's job title is "Head of Crime" and Wilson normalises calls for violence
Slop or Fake Articles Have Turned Linux Journal From a Pioneering/Trailblazing "Linux" Magazine Into a Nuisance
some sites with former reputation - good reputation - turn into cesspools
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Thursday, September 18, 2025
IRC logs for Thursday, September 18, 2025
On Claims That After Bluewashing Red Hat Will Increasingly Become an Indian Company
Discussed this week (long and detailed)
Slopwatch: Google Helps Plagiarism and Sends Traffic to Ripoff Artists
That Google as a company helps spamfarms is noteworthy
Links 18/09/2025: A Taliban Ban on Internet Access and Troubled US Job Market
Links for the day
Gemini Links 18/09/2025: Computer Literacy and Accessing Alhena's Database
Links for the day
Links 18/09/2025: US War on Media (Truth Banned, Cancel Culture by the Hard Right), NYT Chief Executive Warns Cheeto is Deploying ‘Anti-press Playbook'
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, September 17, 2025
IRC logs for Wednesday, September 17, 2025
Slopwatch: Fake Articles, Fake Text, Fake Images, Negative Slant on "Linux"
Google News has lost its value; the signal-to-noise ratio has fallen off a cliff
Gemini Links 17/09/2025: Relax-and-Recover on Proxmox and New Smolweb File Transfer Service
Links for the day
Fact: EFF Got Corrupted by Corporate Money. Microsoft Lunduke (Political Noise): The Issue With EFF is, It Kills Babies.
Microsoft Lunduke - as usual - finds a way to make it about abortions
Pacing Publication Up a Bit
The news cycles have gotten rather light and slow
Links 17/09/2025: Power Outages, Digital Controls, and Attacks on the Mainstream Media (by Insecure and Corrupt Dictators)
Links for the day
Gemini Links 17/09/2025: Flashing LineageOS and ROOPHLOCH
Links for the day
Links 17/09/2025: Long COVID Study, "Exposing Pegasus", and Chatbots Exposing Sensitive Data
Links for the day
Links 17/09/2025: Secret Settlement for Internet Archive and Google’s LLM Slop Summaries Attracting Lawsuits
Links for the day
The True Cost of 'Generative Models'
Funded and promoted by the companies that profit from the waste
'Big Slop' Attacks Contemporary Information/Knowledge and Creative Works, 'Big Copyright' (Cartel) Attacks the Old
Someone at IA will hopefully "blow the whistle" on what they actually agreed
Why We Find It Difficult to Trust Rust
A comparison between C/C++ and Rust
Slop Nihilism is Funded by Big Oil
Eventually human civilisation will destroy itself
Watching the OSI: Our Series Will Carry on Irrespective of the Chief's 'Resignation'
the OSI isn't even the real guardian of the term "Open Source"
Professor Eben Moglen Recovering From Open Heart Surgery
From his public pages (this is not secret)
Just What LibreOffice Needs? Another Language? (Rust)
what's all this concern about memory safety?
Many Microsoft Managers Are Leaving
"Hey hi" chaff or chaff about "hey hi" cannot eternally distract from the difficulties inside the company
There Are Red Hat (IBM) Layoffs, But Google News is Infested With Slopfarms
It contributes a lot to misinformation and it encourages plagiarism
Tomorrow, Microsoft's Tim Anderson's 'The Register MS' Offshoot Will Have Been Inactive for 2 Months (There's Also a Slop Problem)
We've already caught The Register MS using LLM slop for articles
Microsoft's Chief Legal Officer Leaves Microsoft After Nearly 30 Years
And not retiring
Even Windows Users Are Having Problems With "Secure Boot"
When it comes to security - Microsoft strives for the very opposite
Another Competition Crime of Microsoft, Long Facilitated and Advocated by a Bad Actor, Who is Funded by a Third Party to Commit Extortion Against People Who Have Correctly and Repeatedly Warned About It for Over 13 Year
We must always go back to the core issues
3 More Reasons to Replace Mozilla Firefox With LibreWolf
Thankfully there are de-enshittified versions of Firefox
USA Not a Place for Free Speech
In America, as in the US, the attacks seem more enhanced or advanced these days
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, September 16, 2025
IRC logs for Tuesday, September 16, 2025
Links 17/09/2025: Google Layoffs in "Hey Hi" (AI), Perplexity Hit With More "Hey Hi" (Plagiarism) Lawsuits
Links for the day
Gemini Links 17/09/2025: Reclaiming Things in a Digital Age and Moon Phases in CGI
Links for the day