Windows Not Expected Secure Until 2011, Says MS

Rantastic writes "In a recent interview with Wired Magazine, Microsoft Security Program Manager Stephen Toulouse, when asked about their now 2 year old focus on security, comments "it's more of a 10-year timeline." He also reveals that he runs Firefox."

Also admitted

[ReidMaynard]

Stephen Toulouse also admitted he is retiring in 2010...

Longhorn

[Orange Apple]

Now I really havea reason to buy Longhorn... I would move to Linux full time but I can't get MySQL running, grr...

I'm surprised

[Anonymous Coward]

I thought having a CTO/CEO declare security as high priority would get the soldiers all in line and squash all those bugs in millions of lines of code. After all, MS is better at writing software than any other corporate entity right?

Reading between the lines

[El]

"it's more of a 10-year timeline... but my stock options will be fully vested in 5 years, so I'll be long gone before the shit hits the fan on security still not being fixed!"

Re:Missing: Interview

[savagedome]

when will you stop beating your wife?

Mu

in related news

[Anonymous Coward]

slashdot reveals it will not fix the IT color scheme for 10 more years...

7 Years To Go?

[MooseByte]

... So please refrain from computing for the next 7 years. Just go about your lives. Pay no attention to the penguin and cute little red daemon over there. Hey look! Over here! Have this complimentary Plush Clippy!

Service Pack 2

[mishehu]

And gee, I thought that service pack 2 with a firewall that can be controlled by ActiveX was going to fix all of those holes!

Oh, wait, actually service pack 2 renders some computer unbootable, so that must be the real trick!

Re:Download.Ject

[daeley]

Sadly, Firefox isn't affected.

When will Open Source advocates realize that it's just this sort of behind-the-times technological gaffe that will keep Linux in single-digit marketshare forever? ;)

Fat lot of good it will do...

[darth_MALL]

According to the Mayan Calendar [levity.com] We'll only get a year to enjoy it!

No Time Toulouse

[Otis2222222]

The first thing I thought of [utwente.nl] when I saw the guy's name. Still cracks me up everytime I see it. Am I the only one that thought of this sketch?

Move the timeline out indefinately...

[Anonymous Coward]

If everyone is spreading viruses, it ceases to be a stigma, and becomes the accepted norm. Think of it this way:

If everyone had AIDS, you wouldn't have to be all that concerned about STDs now, would you?

New Apple add:
iMac, its like a computer with a condom!

Fine...

[Mateito]

Windows Not Expected Secure Until 2011, Says MS

Fine. I'll hold off installing XP until 2011 then.

Homeland Security Implications

[Anonymous Coward]

Man, that's a long time for Mr. Bush to loose sleep. Should not the States just occupy Microsoft, to prevent an obvious, known threat to Homeland Security?

Re:Honesy

[Anonymous Coward]

You know what they say:

"Honesy is a virtue. :)

Re:Fat lot of good it will do...

[user32.ExitWindowsEx]

actually...think about it. Windows becoming secure...what better sign of the end is there? =P

p.s. someone help me, please! I have 4 gmail invites and only need 4 people to complete an offer. [freeipods.com] sign up for infone or netscape...no fees, i get credit asap, and you can cancel it in a week or so.

Story comes with ad for Microsoft "security"

[Animats]

This Slashdot page is being served with a Microsoft ad boasting about their security. Really.

Re:It's a JOKE

[Ignignot]

You may think that its funny that firefox doesn't support Download.Ject technology, but for the rest of us in the real world, how can we offer it as an alternative to explorer? My PHB will just say "Ignignot, I like this FireFox thing you have working on my computer. But I've read in the Wall Street Journal that it doesn't support Download.Ject. I'm afraid we simply can't afford to make this switch."

We need this feature fixed now if not sooner, otherwise we're all going to be stuck using this insecure MS offering!

When will there ever be a feature complete open source internet explorer??

Re:Also admitted

[southpolesammy]

Perhaps, however I'm pretty sure it won't be from Microsoft after this article....

2011, huh?

[faqmaster]

Great. Linux should be ready for the desktop by then!

Re:Totally

[Duke Machesne]

heh... don't take it so hard ;)

I once spent fifteen minutes arguing that Elvis Costello was in Styx.

Re:Missing: Interview

[Anonymous Coward]

"moo"?

So you're admitting your wife is a cow and are beating her?!?

While I fully understand what you're trying to say, even people who understand what you meant by "Mu" get nothing out of your answer.

A far better answer is "I never have beaten my wife" or "I have no wife".

2011?

[Anonymous Coward]

So Jupiter will collapse into a sun and Europa will support life before Windows is secure?

Linux add....

[vwjeff]

New Apple add:
iMac, its like a computer with a condom!

New add for Linux:

Linux: you can't get infected unless you get laid.

Re:Longhorn

[MooseByte]

"What if God smoked Cannibis?"

Dude, come on. The platypus [pbs.org] is a dead giveaway.

BWAHAHAHAHAHA!!!

[Master of Transhuman]

It doesn't get better than this!

Microsoft will take TEN YEARS to get secure?

After pissing away thirty billion in R&D money for a one-time stock prop scheme?

And their head of security uses Firefox?

This is like discovering Bush prays to Allah!

BWAHAHAHAHAHA!!!

Hey, how about this theory?! Gates is secretly a hacker like the guy in the Sandra Bullock movie and really wants everybody to be insecure so he can take over the world!

BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!

Mod this troll, mod this flamebait! Is that all you got, huh? Are you nuts? Come at me!

Re:Bash away...

[El]

If the stupid driver of the car wants to get drunk and drive backwards 100mph down the freeway with no lights on, do we blame the automobile manufacturer? Yes we should blame the manufacturer, if the vehicle is configure by default to drive 100mph in reverse with the lights off, and it actually requires a more sophisticated user to reconfigure it to go forward more slowly with the lights on...

A more appropriate analogy would be if a car manufacturer made a car with a big, shiny hood ornament, but when anybody pressed on it, it would pop the hood open. Sure, it makes it easier for mechanics to access the engine... but it also make it easier for miscreants to steal your battery!

Re:Fat lot of good it will do...

[MooseByte]

"According to the Mayan Calendar We'll only get a year to enjoy it!"

We won't even get there. I hesitate to instigate a panic, but... MY calendar runs out on Dec 31 of THIS YEAR! AAAIEEEEEE!

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:What?? 100% known secure isn't possible.

[bearl]

I think he meant it would take until 2011 before they had completed fixes for 100% of the currently known security problems.

So what's he's saying is technically possible.

That's a joke folks; start laughing.

Re:Sad

[Sponge Bath]

Crap like this makes me become seriously disenchanted with Slashdot.

Really?

It keeps me coming back for more...
just like Big Macs and nicotine.

Taht's not a FIX... That's a FUX

[Foofoobar]

That's not a fix, that's a FUX. It looks like a fix but if you percieve a FUX to be a FIX, you're bound to get FUXED.

Seriously though, they can't fix it without removing IE from the system. You can easily get around their FUX by using a shell call... which makes this bug even scarier.

Re:Bash away...

[1_interest_1]

Automobile manufacturers do not supply the liquor.

Too bad, too.

Re:Service Pack 2

[Bert64]

Well XP is the most secure windows ever!
Haven't you read the blurb during installation? it also starts much faster than any previous version of windows...
Lets forget about 3.1, which on any machine capable of running XP loads almost instantly and doesn't even support tcp/ip by default, so no chance of getting owned on the internet.

another admission?

[twitter]

I've been curious to hear more about when and where that's actually going to show up.

I thought that M$ was allready [slashdot.org] working with BIOS makers [slashdot.org] on this [linuxdevices.com] and that it was already here. This could be an admission that trusted computing is not secure computing.

Greate Quote!

[danZenie]

Software written by humans will always contain errors.

from know on we should out source non-humans to write all software

er...

[ColonBlow]

when asked about their now 2 year old focus on security, comments "it's more of a 10-year timeline."

I didn't read the article. This was Bush talking about Iraq, right?

My computer at home is 100% secure right now.

[Anonymous Coward]

That's because it is turned off.

Re:Missing: Interview

[acebone]

> "OMG! THEY BUY APPLES!" They own a large stake of the company,

No - they sold that large stake didn't they ?

>Repeat after me: "I am a loser. I fill the void that social retardation has left in my personality with stupid shit that nobody else gives a flying fuck about. My opinion does not matter to anyone but me. My continued insistence on software-as-religion is fucking stupid, and I need to go out and get laid or at LEAST interact with other humans in some way.

Eat your own dogfood man !

Re:Download.Ject

[Dh2000]

Yep, it seems the grandparent installed IE.

Re:Just another example...

[SlightOverdose]

Don't worry. the instant someone commits another change to the Linux Kernel cvs repository or someone uses a GPL program that happens to be less free than another GPL program because GNU/RMS said so we'll know about it.

And of course we'll hear all about the Bowolf cluster in Soviet Russia that set us up and bomb and all your hot grits are belong to Natalie Portman. which will result in a four page flamewar over the correct spelling of Beowulf.

No system is secure

[Pan T. Hose]

Please, let us not be so unfair to Microsoft. No system is 100% secure. I am sure that by 2011 OpenBSD might have another two or maybe even three local exploits in some services not installed by default. Security is very hard and nothing is totally secure, be it Windows, OpenBSD, KeyKOS or EROS--no difference.

Won't be secure until 2011... hmmm

[Allnighterking]

With Longhorn (or maybe since it's had it's most valuable assets removed we should call it Steerhorn) due out in 2006 and Security not reached until 2011, does that means that Windows isn't expecting a secure product until Steerhorns replacement?!?

Oh well maybe by the time my 4 year old graduates from college Windows will be a viable OS. They've always had potential as a desktop OS but keep falling short.

Is it a fix? Or is it a fux?

[Pan T. Hose]

That's not a fix, that's a FUX. It looks like a fix but if you percieve a FUX to be a FIX, you're bound to get FUXED.

Is it a fix? Or is it a fux? No! It's a fox! Firefox!!!