Hard-hitting IT commentator Dr Simon Moores gives his personal take
on the hot issue of the day.When I read the news about Microsoft's
plans to create a "secure" PC environment with a technology called
Palladium, I had a dizzy spell and had to sit down.
You can read it for yourself on
CW360.com and I bet you'll need to sit down too.
Now, the idea of Microsoft building a secure PC is, well, like the
idea of hospitals without waiting lists because, for all the
platitudes about "trusted computing", I have yet to find anyone who
really believes that Microsoft can pull it off and that trusted
computing is anything more than the company "spinning" what it
should have done to its products ten years ago.
In reality though, Microsoft has very little choice to do anything
else but strengthen its software. Quite frankly, computer crime of
one kind or another is costing business billions and governments
are starting to become quite twitchy about the grip the company has
on the public sector.
Microsoft either starts making really secure software or the market
will steadily and incrementally move away from Microsoft.
I believe that Microsoft has seen the light. The problem is that
change will take time, quite probably years, before developments at
the leading edge of the company's technology filter down to the
level of the desktop, where people are still using Windows 95 or
Windows NT.
And that's the problem - Microsoft's incredible success, its grip
on the market and the legacy software it carries with it. These
successes have been, to a large extent, responsible for all the
problems that still plague us.
Before Windows XP, remember the operating system really represented
the software equivalent of a Russian doll. Inside every new
operating system were the remains of earlier systems, one built
upon the other, all the way back to DOS.
But unless we suddenly move to a network computing model, the
vulnerabilities that still remain in hundred of thousands of
systems will render the Microsoft-centric world vulnerable. It
means years to come of buying anti-virus software licences, of
hacks and cracks and worms and Trojans and more.
Microsoft, having unwittingly opened Pandora's box, is now trying
to close it again with clever, innovative technology and a
reassuring new "trust me, I'm from Redmond" smile.
I am, however, prepared to bet that if I bookmark my calendar for a
date 12 months from now, I'll be able to look back on a catalogue
of compromise and disaster, which is little better than the past 12
months.
Steve Ballmer, you have my full support. Put security first and
really mean it. Rally the troops, brandish your corporate sword and
shout "What we do in life, echoes in eternity."
But Steve, you must also consider that, while strengthening future
products shows determination, it's the immediacy and severity of
today's problems that need to be addressed by rather more than
rudimentary security features in Windows XP.
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ZentelligenceSetting the world to rights with the collected thoughts and
ramblings of the futurist writer, broadcaster and Computer Weekly
columnist Simon Moores.