Bonum Certa Men Certa

Never Blame Microsoft, Blame Users and Exploits

"Our products just aren't engineered for security."

--Brian Valentine, Microsoft executive



Microsoft was trying to deflect the blame away from its highly insecure software and onto people who write the exploit/s to take advantage. With the help of the BBC, which it had corrupted, Microsoft proceeded to blaming computer users for Microsoft's shoddy engineering that is even killing people. LinuxToday has a strong rebuttal:



And too stupid or dishonest to report Microsoft Windows as the defective disaster that it is. If it were any other type of product it would have banned from every country in the world long ago. The BBC reports the latest Windows Conficker worm outbreak in typical "oh no big deal" fashion, does not identify this as a Windows worm until several paragraphs into the article, quotes industry security vendors as though they were actually worth listening to and not useless weasels, and then blames end users:



"The worm is spreading through low security networks, memory sticks, and PCs without current security updates... ""Microsoft did a good job of updating people's home computers, but the virus continues to infect business who have ignored the patch update... ""Of course, the real problem is that people haven't patched their software," he added.

Please excuse me while I go kick something. Of COURSE it's the users' fault. They're still using this most expensive piece of defective crapware in the entire solar system. But its incurable defects are not their fault. (We need to give up the notion that such computer users can be rescued by Linux-- we don't WANT them using Linux. "It is impossible to make anything foolproof, because fools are ingenious".)



IDG identified flaws in Windows' update mechanism, but besides, it doesn't really matter if Microsoft patched the flaw. Why was such a huge flaw there in the first place?

Windows Update Shows Its Quirky Side



[...]

While installing the updates, my firewall asked about allowing outbound access to a program running from the E disk, an external hard drive. This was the first time I've seen Windows Update stomp on anything outside of the C disk. The computer had other hard disk partitions with higher letters of the alphabet, so my guess is that it chose the E disk because it had the most available hard disk space.


As we showed before, Vista 7 will change absolutely nothing. In fact, according to some early analyses, Vista 7 may be less secure than Vista, which is far from secure. Here is the very latest:

White hat hackers have created a proof of concept demo illustrating how improved User Account Control (UAC) features in Windows 7 might be completely bypassed.


More here.

Vista 7 starts now

Comments

Recent Techrights' Posts

As Prices Soar and Services Shut Down (Even YouTube Starts Demanding Money for the Original or a Tolerable Experience) It's Time to Explore the Real Alternatives
https://inv.nadeko.net is the most viable instance of Invidious these days
Justice Will Find Its Way at the End
We deserve an award, not SLAPP, for what we've done
March Already, Rumours of IBM Layoffs in Brazil
Red Hat might be impacted too
 
Getting Serial Sloppers to Knock the Habit of Plagiarism by LLM Slop
All in all, the fewer the slop objects, the better
Gemini Links 01/03/2025: Amends and GNU/Linux
Links for the day
Links 01/03/2025: Scam Altman's Latest Excuse, Google Price Hikes
Links for the day
Links 01/03/2025: Squashing Software Patents, USPTO Facing Additional Cuts
Links for the day
Links 01/03/2025: UNM Gopher and Getting One's Pages on gemini://
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Friday, February 28, 2025
IRC logs for Friday, February 28, 2025
Links 28/02/2025: Mass Layoffs at Autodesk, Employee Burnout, and Measles in Texas
Links for the day
Gemini Links 28/02/2025: offpunk, Lagrange, and More
Links for the day
When the Business Goal is to Protect the Image of Criminals From the Mainstream Media or Free/Independent Press (at Any Cost)
What ever happened to the concept of "ethics" in this "legal" occupation?
Skype is Dead, Microsoft Shuts It Down in a Few Months (for Good)
Many billions down the drain
It Has Been Over a Year Since Takedown Demands From Brett Wilson LLP, Nothing Has Been Taken Down
It backfired on the Serial Defamer
Links 28/02/2025: Domestic Violence Fatalities, Escalations Again Near Taiwan
Links for the day
IBM is Trading Employees for Revenue Acquired by Buying Companies and Growing the Debt
IBM's financial plan is corporate bulimia
[Video] Full Video of Richard Stallman's Talk Earlier This Month in Italy (Nexa, Turin)
We have a collection of them
Gemini Links 28/02/2025: Spring, cgi and inetd, Gemini Protocol FAQ
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Thursday, February 27, 2025
IRC logs for Thursday, February 27, 2025
What the LLM Scrapers Are Doing to Tux Machines
So far today it looks like we'll have served about 1.5 million requests at midnight. That's more than 50,000 per hour or 1,000 per minute.
Netcraft's New Web Server Survey Shows Microsoft Down in Every Category
That Microsoft is still visible in
Slopwatch: Anti-Linux Garbage and Fake 'Articles' About GNU and Linux, Courtesy of Serial Sloppers and Slopfarms
Today there is a frustrating amount of FUD online that wasn't published by humans but instead generated by LLMs
Links 27/02/2025: Google Clown Computing Layoffs and Slack Goes Down as Usual
Links for the day
Links 27/02/2025: The Engagement Rehab and Another New Zine
Links for the day
Links 27/02/2025: Microsoft Trying Ads as Sales Fall, Preserving Data From Social Control Media a Real Problem
Links for the day
Hiding Crimes Against Women (i.e. Reputation Laundering) by Misusing Inapplicable Privacy Laws From Another Continent
As it turns out, "privacy" does not cover hiding illegal activities and if public information exists to prove these illegal activities, then it's perfectly OK to share it
Zurich CEO suicide, Martin Senn proximity to Adrian and Diana von Bidder-Senn, Debian
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
Debian, CentOS, RHEL source code demise now linked, accelerated after invalid trademark judgment
Reprinted with permission from Daniel Pocock
Civil Society Should Demand Removal of People Who Sought Removal of Richard Stallman
Perhaps it's noteworthy that the FSF is now being attacked (again)
RTO for You, But Not for Me: How IBM's Managers Try to Disguise Layoffs as "Resignations" or "Retirements"
What ever happened to corporate ethics?
Links 27/02/2025: Conflict Updates, Hacks Caught Red-Handed Misusing Licence to Exercise Law to Submit LLM Slop to Courts
Links for the day
Gemini Links 27/02/2025: Fuzzy Frontiers and New Arrivals at Geminispace
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, February 26, 2025
IRC logs for Wednesday, February 26, 2025