Microsoft acknowledges its engineers placed security flaw in software By Ted Bridis THE WALL STREET JOURNAL April 14  Microsoft Corp. acknowledged Thursday that its engineers included in some of its Internet software a secret password  a phrase deriding their rivals at Netscape as weenies  that could be used to gain illicit access to hundreds of thousands of Internet sites world-wide.....

link.

-- abc (123@456.789), April 14, 2000

Answers

abc -

Well, blow me over. :) I thought that since Microsoft had been caught doing things like this once before, that MAYBE they had learned their lesson. Guess not. (I secretly didn't expect them to STOP doing their nasty deeds)

-- (Sheeple@Greener.Pastures), April 14, 2000.

Excerpts reproduced for educational and informational purposes only

Woody's Office Watch #5.17
Date: Fri, 14 Apr 2000 08:56:31 -0400

"Among the recent arrivals on the Microsoft web site is the 'Save My Settings' wizard. It is a 275kb download from http://officeupdate.microsoft.com/2000/downloadDetails/o2ksmsdd.htm. It will collect all your Office 2000 settings into a single file and copy them to the Microsoft web site. The idea being that you can retrieve the settings to another computer or the same computer after a crash

According to Microsoft the settings collected include 'The data in your Office settings includes your Passport ID and your MS Office personal settings...'

The main shortcoming is that you can only save the settings to the Microsoft web site. This must be a deliberate choice and it's a curious one....

We wonder why the MS Passport ID is included in the saved settings? It has nothing directly to do with Office 2000 and isn't required for it to run. Nor is the Passport used to authenticate your access to the saved settings...

Whether or not you trust Microsoft to keep your settings confidential is a personal choice. The company gives their usual assurances in that regard..."

-- (Bill G. is@the.Antichrist), April 14, 2000.

This is a virus.

-- (BillGates@M.Soft), April 14, 2000.

Who's almost ready to feel sorry for Microsoft?

-- Hawk (flyin@high.again), April 14, 2000.

AOL-Time/Warner-Netscape-Sun-Oracle-Open Source/Linux-CBS-ABC-CNN-WSJ- MP3-and the gullable public vs Microsoft, using your tax dollars, how sweet. Freaking Judge has no clue HOW MS is a monopoly, but he has a hunch something ain't Kosher in Redmond, pleeeze.

Main reason Windows is so buggy?. Not even going to go on about the crappy hardware around(common motherboards alone must be 75% utter crap), but MS is up against many who knowingly or unknowingly create user headaches. Amazing most of it works frankly. MS is no angel, but helps if one understands the current paradigm before one passes the Meme.

Easy to jump on the bashMS bandwagon, THEY are counting on you being on it. Only suggesting one does a tad of research before one submits self to the BashMS Meme. What you are witnessing is a push by many in cahoots to monopolize the internet(see list above). What form will the internet take? WebTV is your clue. As it stands now, I predict webboards/websites like this one will be like Usenet and Gopher is today, on the back alleys of the internet.

Further reading for any Open Source pundits...click

-- Attack-Paulie (fannybubbles@usa.net), April 14, 2000.