For years, Microsoft has come under heavy fire for not making its systems secure enough. Now, with the upcoming release of its new operating system (OS), Windows Vista, the company is being unfairly attacked by self-interested competitors for adding more security to protect consumers.
Back in 2002, when Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates announced that the company would be making security a priority, the computing industry responded with a collective, “Finally.” Thomas Greene, writing for the Register, reported at the time that “Bill finally admits that the company has wrongly emphasized whistles and bells over security, and decrees that this shall change.” He went on to say, “Hallelujah. He’s finally arrived on the same page as the rest of the computing world.”
Greene’s analysis would have been more accurate if he had written, “the rest of the computing world except for those who will lose business when consumers’ computing lives become more secure.” But Greene wrote long before McAfee decided to place a full-page advertisement in the Financial Times predicting doom and gloom if Microsoft is allowed to make its own product more secure.
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The Technology Liberation Front is the tech policy blog dedicated to keeping politicians' hands off the 'net and everything else related to technology.
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