Microsoft's European Catch-22
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Would a European Commission decision cause the software maker "great harm"?
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Stop me if you've heard this one before The European Commission is launching two formal investigations into Microsoft.â¦
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Microsoft MSFT.O said on Thursday it   was on track to launch its Windows Vista operating system in   Europe in January but again asked the European Commission to   detail concerns it may have with the system.
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Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT) says it will obey any directives issued by the European Union  over the modification of Windows. European regulators have ordered the  world's biggest software maker to offer a version of its operating  system without its media player.
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Software giant Microsoft  has  filed an appeal against a 280.5 million euro ($356.4 million)  fine the European Commission imposed in July, holding it defied  a 2004 antitrust ruling.
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Red tape vs Redmond...the never ending story The European Commission has hit back at suggestions it has got it in for Microsoft over security features built into the heavily-delayed Windows Vista.â¦
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Investor's Business Daily - Antitrust: Microsoft, a company that has enriched millions and provided an immeasurable boost to the global economy, is being treated like a criminal in Europe -- which has a funny way of defining justice.
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The European Commission has again criticized Microsoft's response to a 2004 antitrust ruling, opening up the possibility of further fines for the company. The regulator said that the software giant proposes overcharging for vital interoperability information needed by rival software makers to allow their products work properly with the Windows operating system.
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Next version of Windows will create a cascade of benefits for local European economies, says Microsoft-sponsored study.
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Microsoft Corp has submitted documents  required by the European Commission in an effort to avoid  further fines for breaching an antitrust ruling, the European  Union regulator said on Monday.
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Microsoft's purpose for suggesting its Office Open XML suite of formats become adopted as an international standard is not so it can leverage its seal of approval in sales. Its purpose is to enable the company to be perceived worldwide as cooperating with businesses and with nations in the drive for interoperability, especially for the benefit of the European Commission which maintains that Microsoft is an unfair competitor.
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The European Commission will fine  Microsoft  between 200 million (&#36;255 million) and 300  million euros on Wednesday to punish it for failing to carry  out antitrust sanctions, sources familiar with the situation  said on Tuesday.
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The European Commission has opened two new antitrust investigations of Microsoft's activities.
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European antitrust regulators worry that Microsoft could dominate the burgeoning market for digital rights management software
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Microsoft will be ready to comply with European Commission demands for changes to its Windows operating systems if a European court does not suspend the antitrust remedy, a company spokesman said today.
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BERLIN While competitors hailed a European judge&#39;s decision to force Microsoft to sell a stripped-down version of its Windows computer operating software without a media player, analysts said European consumers may be less than pleased.
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(InfoWorld) - The European Commission warned Microsoft again Tuesday that planned security features in the upcoming Windows Vista operating system could run afoul of EU antitrust laws, prompting Microsoft to say that an adverse ruling from European regulators could further delay Vista's ship date. In a statement Tuesday, EU Commission spokesman on competition Jonathan Todd said that the Commission believes that diversity and innovation in the security software market could be threatened if Microsoft doesn't allow reputable third-party security vendors to compete on an equal footing for customers. The statements came in response to questions from journalists who had been briefed by Microsoft, Todd told InfoWorld. Microsoft is reaching out to members of the press to express concern about the EC's stance on Vista security and to explain the reasoning that went into the company's decisions to integrate some security functions in the Vista operating system, according to Stephen Toulouse, of Microsoft's Security Technology Unit. "We're doing what everyone asked us to do and making Vista secure," Toulouse told InfoWorld on Tuesday. "We believe we've set the security foundation higher in Vista than in other operating systems and we don't want to lower that," he said. Microsoft is committed to delivering an EC-compliant operating system, and would abide by requests from the European Commission to remove security features if necessary, Toulouse said. Unraveling security features such as the BitLocker drive encryption, Windows Defender and Windows Security Center from Vista at this late date would be a monumental task, however. "I can't even speculate on how we'd deal with a request like that," Toulouse said, although he didn't rule out delays in the global release of Vista. Todd rejected the idea that the EC would give a "green light" to any particular version of Vista, but said that Microsoft would have to produce a product that complies with EU competition rules, or risk an antitrust ruling from the Commission. "We've made it clear to (Microsoft) for some time that it's up to Microsoft to make products that are fully compliant with EU competition rules, particularly in light of the March 2004 ruling on its abuse of its dominant market position," Todd said. NeelieKroes, the European Commission's competition commissioner, wrote to Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer in March to express concerns about the security features and requesting more information on them, but the company delayed responding to the letter until the end of August, Todd said.Â  Microsoft did a full court press on Tuesday to try to counter the EC's statements about antitrust concerns with Vista's security features, emphasizing the company's work with independent software vendors. Speaking with InfoWorld, Toulouse, until recently program manager for Microsoft's Security Response Center (MSRC), explained the company's reasoning in adopting security features such as Patchguard, a feature on 64-bit versions of Vista that prevents applications from "patching," or modifying the Vista core processing center, or "kernel." Patchguard was necessary to stop unauthorized applications and malicious programs from modifying the Vista kernel to take control of the operating system. Legitimate third party products, however, such as behavioral detection products, also need access to the kernel. Symantec Corp. executives have complained that Microsoft is using its dominance of the operating system market and hard line stance on kernel patching to stifle competition, but Microsoft allows third parties to extend the Vista kernel using signed, kernel-mode drivers, Toulouse said. Microsoft's security products, such as Windows Live OneCare and Forefront, don't get an inside track to Vista features, Toulouse said. "We play by the same rules with our own products," Toulouse said. "Nobody patches the kernel." Toulouse also downplayed the impact of Patchguard, saying that adoption of 64 bit Vista would be slow, given that fewer applications have been written to run on it, and the 32-bit version of Vista runs on new, 64-bit platforms. On other security features, such as the Windows Security Center user interface, Microsoft allows ISVs to use the features or ignore them. The company has also made it easy for competitors to turn off default security features like the Windows Defender anti-spyware product and Vista desktop firewall silently during installation, Toulouse said.Â  Microsoft has made great efforts to give third party vendors such as Symantec access to Vista, such as giving Symantec employees office space at the company's Redmond, Washington, headquarters and access to Vista source code and builds, Toulouse said. The EC isn't opposed to Microsoft improving the security of Vista, but believes that there needs to be diversity in the security market to stimulate innovation, Todd said. The EC is still evaluating the information Microsoft sent in August on the Vista security features and hasn't decided what additional guidance it will give Microsoft. There were similarities between the EC's position on Vista's integrated security features and the Commission's ruling on Microsoft's bundling of the Windows Media Player, Todd said. That dispute resulted in a â¬497 million fine against Microsoft in March 2004 for anti-competitive practices. Todd acknowledged, however, that security features also had a unique status. "There's an extra dimension with security products. If I have a computer without a media player, it's not the end of the world. But a computer without security countermeasures is in deep trouble," Todd said. "Clearly we don't expect Microsoft to sell software that would be vulnerable to security problems," Todd said.