Hackers to seize control of a victim’s Windows computer over the Internet, stealing data, deleting files or eavesdropping on e-mails. The company urged customers to immediately apply a free software repairing patch available from Microsoft’s Web site.
Truly trustworthy?
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The disclosure was unusually embarrassing for Microsoft because it demonstrated the first such serious flaw in the company’s powerful new computer server software, billed as its safest ever.
The software is aimed at large corporate customers and was the first product sold under a high-profile “Trustworthy Computing” initiative organized last year by Microsoft founder Bill Gates.
Found in Poland
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“This is one of the worst Windows vulnerabilities ever,” said Marc Maiffret, an executive at eEye Digital Security Inc. of Aliso Viejo, California, whose researchers discovered similarly dangerous flaws in at least three earlier versions of Windows.
Maiffret said that insidevulnerable corporations, “until they have this patch installed, it will be Swiss cheese — anybody can walk in and out of their servers.”
Spending millions
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Microsoft spent hundreds of millions of dollars on security improvements for its latest Windows software and included new technology to defend against a category of hacker attacks known as “buffer overflows,”.
The head of Microsoft’s security response center, Kevin Kean, said improving Windows software is an ongoing process.
