Microsoft SPP the ultimate security risk?

Stan Beer
Saturday, 07 October 2006 21:41

Opinion and Analysis

So we could end up with genuine users being forced to prove their innocence or fork over extra money on top of what they've already been paid just to keep their systems running.

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That aside, there is something far more ominous about the implications of having a big brother anti-piracy tool built in to Vista itself, regularly checking up on you with the ability to shut down any PC running Windows Vista on the planet. What if it's hacked?

In fact, as some bloggers have pointed out, SPP may be a perfect target for hackers. What better way to shut down PCs throughout an entire organization than to plant an exploit of a vulnerability in SPP on a machine in a corporate network that makes the system think that its Microsoft programs are pirated?

Microsoft says it wants to reduce software piracy. This is understandable. The software company's business model is built upon selling software not giving it away.

However, there are other ways to reduce piracy than building high-tech intrusive tools into the operating system. Making it madatory to provide a copy protected Microsoft Vista DVD with each computer sold would be a start. Hey if you have the DVD, register it with Microsoft and get an automatic confirmation email back from the company with a link to click on to activate the system, that might work.

If one were to be cynical, it may even appear that Microsoft does not seem to be all that concerned about how users are able to get hold of pirated versions of Vista. After all, with SPP a pirate user can be turned into a genuine user. So for Microsoft, Vista piracy could end being a good business opportunity. Nah, that's far too cynical.