Microsoft has always carefully protected the source code to its operating systems. […] One reason Microsoft doesn’t release its code is that its source code is the company’s crown jewels, it’s proprietary advantage. […] But the prime reason is security. If its source code were made public, it might be easier for hackers to find vulnerabilities and exploit them — anything from breaking into systems to merely breaking to serial number validation process.
[…]
Microsoft has turned over all its source code for Windows 7, along with its source for Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2, Microsoft Office 2010 and Microsoft SQL Server to Russia’s [… FSB, the] present-day Russia’s successor to the infamous Soviet-era KGB.As has become quite apparent over the last week, Russia is far from out of the espionage business. […] The agency that took over from the KGB and which has been just recently proven to be conducting long-term spying operations against the United States now has access to Windows source code — while at the same time, most American IT operations don’t.
Not only does this give the Russians the opportunity to find gaps in Windows security — it gives them the opportunity to do so while most American companies and organizations don’t have the same opportunity to find the same gaps and plug them.
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I don’t get it can someone explain or maybe the next episode of NO AGENDA will elaborate-please.
RTFA. So what?
Reading through the link and the link the linked article links to…
It makes me wonder if China was given the goods which aided in this year’s cyberattack against Google and those 30 other companies.
Remember? Now Google is saying that they are dumping Microsoft for Linux. Coincidence?
Okay I do have an older machine that runs Linux smooth as glass.
I wonder if they also gave this data to the FBI/CIA/NSA and no telling who else.
Big deal, it’s the same source code any volume licence holder can get through the Shared Source Initiative.
Of course the US government has access to the code.
Even better, universities have access to the code through this program (which has existed for years): http://microsoft.com/resources/sharedsource/windowsacademic/default.mspx
So, Uncle Dave, what’s the big deal here?
I was talking to a MS employee about that this morning. He thinks that MS feels that the real threat is Google and Google’s Chrome. Windows, contrary to the article’s claims, is no longer MS’s “Crown Jewels”.
OS’s, are now free. Linux is free. Chrome will be free. MS doesn’t want to bet their financial future on the OS.
However, that doesn’t explain why they gave away MS Office. WTF? Office is a crown jewel, and it is still the premier office suite out there. The only explanation is that Google Docs is scaring the shit out of MS.
The employee also explained that the agreement is NDA’ed out the wazoo. But on the other hand, as I pointed out to him, all the NDAs in the world won’t prevent the source code from slipping out the back door and into the hands of the Chinese and Russian organized crime. Really… what is MS going to do when that happens? Sue the FSB? Good luck with that.
I asked him what he though if the US government, local governments, the defense departments banned Windows and Office in the future because of the threat of exploits from Russia/China/et. all? Wouldn’t MS be loosing one of its biggest customers?
He feels that the threat is no greater. There are plenty of bugs to exploit even without the source code. I feel that the government and DoD won’t see it that way.
The bottom line: This shows that MS feels that its future is elsewhere. In particular, online in advertising based cloud solutions. competing head to head with Google.
Oh, good. I only bought one legal copy of 7. Soon I’ll be able to get a couple of Russian copies for $3 each for the other two. Right now, I’m running 7, XP and Linux.
#7: And if the Russians fix bugs in the code, it may work better than a Microsoft version.
Everybody and their dog has the MS windows source code, it’s included in the academic license for every university.
Putting the source code out there would reduce the security risk, that’s why DES, AES etc are all published.
#9… really? Windows 7 and Office 2010 source code is available at Uni? First I heard of that.
I wonder who else has a legal copy of the source code (outside of Russia and Universities)?
is this serious? i want the source code too!