MS has biggest security launch for a year - bit-tech.net Forums

WilHarris · 15th Jun 2006, 16:38

http://www.bit-tech.net/news/2006/06...se_for_a_year/

DXR_13KE · 15th Jun 2006, 17:56

one thing that amazes me is how can a OS that has been lauched in 2001 (correct me if i am wrong), is around for about 5 years and still has security holes and bugs in it, and the extra is that you have to pay (sometimes) allot for it, and still it is unsafe.
i realy realy REALY hope Vista is not a BIG hole that has to be pluged every once in a while like XP is.

olly_lewis · 15th Jun 2006, 18:18

More and more fixes from Microsoft, well i havent used Automatic Updates in a while, give Windows Explorer and little run through...
The reason that such an old OS is so buggy is that it was rushed and that the world of hackers and worm makers will always looking fr the smallest holes in security and programs, could be worse, remember NT and ME, those should never of been released, not for anther 6 months at least.
Lets hope that Vista is a little more delayed so they can iron out a few bugs and holes, but its doubtful...

Lazarus Dark · 15th Jun 2006, 19:00

hehe my laptop came with me, many bsods, got xp asap, maybe five bsods ever, say what you want but xp is more stable than any previous ms os.

even if they didn't release any more patches/fixes until vista, they should not have said "u are cut off" to 95/98 customers until then. its like u are cut off, so either get xp which we will cut off in a couple years, or hang in limbo till vista. buisiness customers still using these must not be happy.

as far as xp patches, well, better they give me a hundred patches than give hackers one easy route to take over my sys. its imposible to prevent patches, as windows NEEDS to be open to all hardware and software. this is its great advantagfe and its weakness.

Faulk_Wulf · 15th Jun 2006, 19:00

Welcome to Microsoft's standard operating procedure:

Money before Usability.

LukR · 15th Jun 2006, 21:04

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lazarus Dark

...
buisiness customers still using these must not be happy.
...

IMO realy big business customers use W2k, so they don't care about 98 or ME.

gpw111 · 15th Jun 2006, 22:04

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lazarus Dark

even if they didn't release any more patches/fixes until vista, they should not have said "u are cut off" to 95/98 customers until then. its like u are cut off, so either get xp which we will cut off in a couple years, or hang in limbo till vista. buisiness customers still using these must not be happy.

Tbh i think people still using win98 should have upgraded years ago - after all xp has been out a good while now. Certainly no-one should be using 95-i dont care wot reason they give. So its hardly unreasonable of MS to stop patching operating systems which are in some cases 10 years old.

Mister_Tad · 15th Jun 2006, 22:31

Dont blame them for ditching 95/98, large enterprise clients wouldn't be using anything older than 2000, though some lower budget and charitable organisations may be affected, but thats just a fact of life... you can't expect them to support it forever. Where do they draw the line, 3.11, 3.1, 3.0, DOS6?

I think a lot of people don't realise, saying things like "xp has been out since 2001" that windows is a constantly changing beast, with holes being opened and plugged all of the time... beast in that way that its entirely infeasible (and impossible) to patch every hole in such a phenomenal amount of code. It's the same with any OS. User friendliness and convenience mean that security vulnerabilities start opening up. Would you rather MS didn't bother patching them and jsut keep them under wraps and hope nobody notices?

tbh, I wish people would just stop bitching about MS (contrary to what some believe, calling them M$ is neither funnny nor clever) and just switch to something else if it pisses them off so much

</rant>

yodasarmpit · 15th Jun 2006, 23:06

Mister_Tad hit the nail on the head, XP is ever evolving, it's not a static beast, if it were I would expect there to be virtually zero security flaws.

Other than MS Blast I have had no issues with XP since launch.

There are those that spend their time looking for and exploiting security vulnerabilities, but MS release a fix and all is well again, I don't see the problem.

yahooadam · 15th Jun 2006, 23:39

the number of security holes in are rediculous though, do u see this many patches for linux ?

Paradigm Shifter · 15th Jun 2006, 23:57

Patches and updates don't bother me.

Most of the problem is the media - they grab hold of something and never let go. Someone finds a loophole in something, somehow it leaks out that Microsoft have known about it for the past six months, media goes mad.

As a perfectionist, I wish they'd get it right first time. As a computer user, however, I know that isn't possible.

And each patch has to go through a lot of testing, to make sure something else isn't broken in the process of fixing the security hole. I'm sure no one would be pleased if they installed the latest security fix to discover they could no longer talk to their network, or whatever.

cpemma · 16th Jun 2006, 00:12

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mister_Tad

User friendliness and convenience mean that security vulnerabilities start opening up.

In the beginning, email was plain ASCII text-only and virus-proof. Now you can add font effects, pictures, sounds, and nasties. Same with ActiveX, added to enhance things for the end user, but bad people took advantage.

Time to start slamming the bad people, not MS. Windows are made of glass to enhance the user's view. But it means they're vulnerable to bricks.

Glider · 16th Jun 2006, 00:14

Quote:

Originally Posted by yahooadam

the number of security holes in are rediculous though, do u see this many patches for linux ?

Yes you do... weekly almost... but they don't come out under the name patches... If I do my dayly update on my gentoo laptop, I allways get 2-3 packages that require updates, and those updates are 99% security fixes... Just look how easy it is to get into a webserver running apache 1... Because XP is in fact running the initial release, I think it's more then normal that they dish out patches... If they would stop doing that, I'd feel more threatend when I'm in XP, because then I know that there are more and more ways for hackers to get in.

Realise this, no system is 100% secure, every software has bugs... Nothing is perfect... So good job MS, for fixing yet another way for malicious people/software from getting in to an XP system...

quack · 16th Jun 2006, 00:19

On our WSUS box we had 69 updates to push out. That's for 2000, XP, 2003, Exchange and a couple other MS products.

Just a reminder... if you're still using Windows Update, don't... upgrade to Microsoft Update instead. It's much better.

yahooadam · 16th Jun 2006, 01:43

i dunno who originally said it, but i like the quote
"Nothing is foolproof as fools are so ingenious"
The weakest link in any system will probably be human error on the end user part (spyware and viruses getting on)

Sord_Fish · 16th Jun 2006, 02:24

Quote:

Originally Posted by gpw111

Tbh i think people still using win98 should have upgraded years ago - after all xp has been out a good while now. Certainly no-one should be using 95-i dont care wot reason they give. So its hardly unreasonable of MS to stop patching operating systems which are in some cases 10 years old.

You'd be surprised, Round about last year i went to the cinema, while we were picking our seats the computer kept lagging, asked why and the guy said they were still running 95.

Maybe on a buiness side of things this is a problem that there are bugs, but how important is stealing Joe bloggs data.
I switched to Firefox, vlc and Open Office, and i've had no problems i've even told my friends to do the same and i've had less problems to fix since.

In genral though i think the whole dig at XP thing is pretty lame like Mister_Tad said.
As it goes XP works 99% of the time.

perplekks45 · 16th Jun 2006, 07:11

Gotta agree with above and Mister_Tad.
XP simply has all this holes showing up because someone looks for them. Linux might be safer than Windows but it might be due to the fact hackers keep going for Windows and not Linux systems as it's pretty the standard OS around.
If Linux and Windows switched places Linux would be screwed in a couple of weeks just like Windows now. MS try to make everything possible for Joe Average so they have to keep it simple, simple sometimes mean unsafe... not that I do like MS or the way they treat customers but I can understand what they're doing and why... at least sometimes. What I mean is when you try to make everything as easy to access as possible how would you make it 100% safe at the same moment? Surely there are better ways but they did a nice job with XP... hopefully Vista too. And thankfully there's Internet nowadays so you CAN close the holes (kinda) fast.

eddtox · 16th Jun 2006, 07:41

Personally, I appreciate the fact that M$ provide updates and security fixes as XP is a dynamic OS, and therefore constantly changing. I would be much more worried if they didn't provide any updates. However, I do think that some of the problems which XP shipped with could have been fixed prior to release. Just my $0.02

-ed out

mattyt · 16th Jun 2006, 08:01

Quote:

Originally Posted by aon`aTv.gsus666

If Linux and Windows switched places Linux would be screwed in a couple of weeks just like Windows now.

Totally not! - apples and oranges. If linux was configured as a non-webserver like windows is out of the box it WOULD NOT be screwed in a couple of weeks at all.

The fact is linux is an OS that requires more in-depth knowledge and tech savvy than windows. Hence it winds up on either enthusiasts (usually coders) machines or webservers.

Anyway, i hope vista will be a little better. So long as they can evade the business destroying havoc wreaking examples of worms that we saw the other year that'd be a huge step forward.

Cthippo · 16th Jun 2006, 08:07

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sord_Fish

You'd be surprised, Round about last year i went to the cinema, while we were picking our seats the computer kept lagging, asked why and the guy said they were still running 95.

Maybe on a buiness side of things this is a problem that there are bugs, but how important is stealing Joe bloggs data.
I switched to Firefox, vlc and Open Office, and i've had no problems i've even told my friends to do the same and i've had less problems to fix since.

In genral though i think the whole dig at XP thing is pretty lame like Mister_Tad said.
As it goes XP works 99% of the time.

The only systems I hav XP on are my laptop because it came with it and my promary desktop because I had to have it do use multiple CPUs. Everything else I run has ME on it because I am the last person on the planet who actually LIKES Win ME. IMO XP was the OS written for people who should not be allowed to use a computer and it was shoved down the throats of everyone else, just like Vista will be. Aside from the OS, I use Opera and OpenOffice and have very few problems. I will say that I've had far more headaches since I started running XP Pro64 as my promary OS than I ever did with ME, especially with driver issues.

So if MS is no longer supporting 98/ME, does that mean the don't care that um, *people*, have the same copy running on 14 different machines?

<RANT> THis also means that when I get home I'll have to set up several things on the primary machine because their patch process restarts without asking me. Why is it that a software manufacturer should take it upon themselves to restart MY computer without MY consent??? What gives them the right??

</RANT>

15th Jun 2006, 16:38	#1
WilHarris Just another nobody Join Date: Jun 2001 Location: Oxford Posts: 2,671	MS has biggest security launch for a year http://www.bit-tech.net/news/2006/06...se_for_a_year/

15th Jun 2006, 17:56	#2
DXR_13KE Madeira's banana is the best!!! Join Date: Sep 2005 Location: Madeira ; Portugal Posts: 6,469	one thing that amazes me is how can a OS that has been lauched in 2001 (correct me if i am wrong), is around for about 5 years and still has security holes and bugs in it, and the extra is that you have to pay (sometimes) allot for it, and still it is unsafe. i realy realy REALY hope Vista is not a BIG hole that has to be pluged every once in a while like XP is. __________________ *Renegade X - 0.40 Release!* <---- CLICK!

15th Jun 2006, 19:00	#4
Lazarus Dark Supermodder Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: US Memphis, TN Posts: 292	hehe my laptop came with me, many bsods, got xp asap, maybe five bsods ever, say what you want but xp is more stable than any previous ms os. even if they didn't release any more patches/fixes until vista, they should not have said "u are cut off" to 95/98 customers until then. its like u are cut off, so either get xp which we will cut off in a couple years, or hang in limbo till vista. buisiness customers still using these must not be happy. as far as xp patches, well, better they give me a hundred patches than give hackers one easy route to take over my sys. its imposible to prevent patches, as windows NEEDS to be open to all hardware and software. this is its great advantagfe and its weakness. __________________ My gun kata is greater than your kung fu.

15th Jun 2006, 23:06	#9
yodasarmpit The other Brett. Moderator Join Date: May 2002 Location: West Lothian , Scotland Posts: 9,664	Mister_Tad hit the nail on the head, XP is ever evolving, it's not a static beast, if it were I would expect there to be virtually zero security flaws. Other than MS Blast I have had no issues with XP since launch. There are those that spend their time looking for and exploiting security vulnerabilities, but MS release a fix and all is well again, I don't see the problem. __________________ The Rt. Hon. Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson - "Ping Pong is coming home" www.yodasarmpit.com clickr my flickr

15th Jun 2006, 23:57	#11
Paradigm Shifter Lethargic Join Date: May 2006 Posts: 1,213	Patches and updates don't bother me. Most of the problem is the media - they grab hold of something and never let go. Someone finds a loophole in something, somehow it leaks out that Microsoft have known about it for the past six months, media goes mad. As a perfectionist, I wish they'd get it right first time. As a computer user, however, I know that isn't possible. And each patch has to go through a lot of testing, to make sure something else isn't broken in the process of fixing the security hole. I'm sure no one would be pleased if they installed the latest security fix to discover they could no longer talk to their network, or whatever. __________________ Core i7 920 D0 @ 3.8GHz \| 6GB Corsair 1600MHz \| Gigabyte EX58-UD5 \| XFX 4870X2 2GB \| 4TB \| WUXGA

15th Jun 2006, 18:18	#3
olly_lewis Hypermodder Join Date: May 2006 Location: United Kingdom Posts: 756	More and more fixes from Microsoft, well i havent used Automatic Updates in a while, give Windows Explorer and little run through... The reason that such an old OS is so buggy is that it was rushed and that the world of hackers and worm makers will always looking fr the smallest holes in security and programs, could be worse, remember NT and ME, those should never of been released, not for anther 6 months at least. Lets hope that Vista is a little more delayed so they can iron out a few bugs and holes, but its doubtful...

15th Jun 2006, 19:00	#5
Faulk_Wulf Internet Addict Join Date: Mar 2006 Location: USA Posts: 280	Welcome to Microsoft's standard operating procedure: Money before Usability.

15th Jun 2006, 22:31	#8
Mister_Tad Serious about coffee Moderator Join Date: Dec 2002 Location: Nottingham Posts: 7,556	Dont blame them for ditching 95/98, large enterprise clients wouldn't be using anything older than 2000, though some lower budget and charitable organisations may be affected, but thats just a fact of life... you can't expect them to support it forever. Where do they draw the line, 3.11, 3.1, 3.0, DOS6? I think a lot of people don't realise, saying things like "xp has been out since 2001" that windows is a constantly changing beast, with holes being opened and plugged all of the time... beast in that way that its entirely infeasible (and impossible) to patch every hole in such a phenomenal amount of code. It's the same with any OS. User friendliness and convenience mean that security vulnerabilities start opening up. Would you rather MS didn't bother patching them and jsut keep them under wraps and hope nobody notices? tbh, I wish people would just stop bitching about MS (contrary to what some believe, calling them M$ is neither funnny nor clever) and just switch to something else if it pisses them off so much </rant>

15th Jun 2006, 23:39	#10
yahooadam Ultra csavarkulcs Banned Join Date: Mar 2006 Location: UK Posts: 1,323	the number of security holes in are rediculous though, do u see this many patches for linux ?

16th Jun 2006, 00:19	#14
quack \o/ Join Date: Mar 2002 Location: England Posts: 5,221	On our WSUS box we had 69 updates to push out. That's for 2000, XP, 2003, Exchange and a couple other MS products. Just a reminder... if you're still using Windows Update, don't... upgrade to Microsoft Update instead. It's much better. __________________ Denying Rights to Music lovers. Denying Rights to Movie lovers.

16th Jun 2006, 01:43	#15
yahooadam Ultra csavarkulcs Banned Join Date: Mar 2006 Location: UK Posts: 1,323	i dunno who originally said it, but i like the quote "Nothing is foolproof as fools are so ingenious" The weakest link in any system will probably be human error on the end user part (spyware and viruses getting on)

16th Jun 2006, 07:11	#17
perplekks45 BSc... finally Join Date: May 2004 Location: Vienna, Austria Posts: 3,349	Gotta agree with above and Mister_Tad. XP simply has all this holes showing up because someone looks for them. Linux might be safer than Windows but it might be due to the fact hackers keep going for Windows and not Linux systems as it's pretty the standard OS around. If Linux and Windows switched places Linux would be screwed in a couple of weeks just like Windows now. MS try to make everything possible for Joe Average so they have to keep it simple, simple sometimes mean unsafe... not that I do like MS or the way they treat customers but I can understand what they're doing and why... at least sometimes. What I mean is when you try to make everything as easy to access as possible how would you make it 100% safe at the same moment? Surely there are better ways but they did a nice job with XP... hopefully Vista too. And thankfully there's Internet nowadays so you CAN close the holes (kinda) fast. __________________ "The most merciful thing in the world, I think, is the inability of the human mind to correlate all its contents. We live on a placid island of ignorance in the midst of black seas of infinity, and it was not meant that we should voyage far." Blame it on Cheaps! [now a social group]

16th Jun 2006, 07:41	#18
eddtox Supermodder Join Date: Jan 2006 Location: Medway Posts: 345	Personally, I appreciate the fact that M$ provide updates and security fixes as XP is a dynamic OS, and therefore constantly changing. I would be much more worried if they didn't provide any updates. However, I do think that some of the problems which XP shipped with could have been fixed prior to release. Just my $0.02 -ed out