Microsoft Windows has been out in its many variants for over 20 years. The first versions were overlays on DOS and had very good security compard to the current versions. Why does it seem impossible for Microsoft to write a new version without including most, if not all, of the vulnerabilities that were found and patched in the previous versions?
Some think this is laziness, other see a conspiracy. I don’t know which, but it is bloody annoying to have to spend a lot of time keeping up with the vulnerabilities and loading the patches.
Yet each version is touted as being the most secure yet, then within weeks we have the patches for previously known faults. Soon we are told we can expect to see the first fruits of the MS involvement in Trusted Computing and that this new software will be totally secure and have a big brother tie that will make Orwells 1984 look liberal and open minded.
This leads me to ask some questions:
1. Does anyone really think that MS will get this right with no known vulnerability types at time of launch?
2. Does anyone really expect that they can trust MS with the centralised data that they say they need to make the Trusted Computing to work?
3. Is there any real corrolation between the current lock down on software etc by MS and the movement by small business to Linux/Unix systems?
Thoughts and comments on these points are most welcome. Yes I know I have thrown the cat amongst the pidgeons on this, please try not to throw too many more in.