Microsoft Claims Exchange is Stealing Notes Users
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Adoption of Outlook, Exchange Server, and Sharepoint Server took a big jump in 2007, Microsoft says.
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(InfoWorld) - Microsoft forced a popular alternative to Windows Update off the Internet today, sending the maker of AutoPatcher cease-and-desist e-mail. The free utility has been removed from its download site. Microsoft did not give a reason for the move, which came more than four years after AutoPatcher debuted. "Today we received an e-mail from Microsoft requesting the immediate take-down of the download page, which of course means that AutoPatcher is probably history," said Antonis Kaladis, the 20-year-old Greek college student and author of the program. "As much as we disagree, we can do very little, and although the download page is merely a collection of mirrors, we took the download page down." AutoPatcher, which was in version 5.6, let users collect Windows hotfixes and security patches from Microsoft's update services, then package them so they could be applied to multiple machines, or reused multiple times on a single PC. It was especially popular among people who frequently reformatted drives or those who did informal tech support for friends and family or in a small business. Each month, the current set of Windows' -- and as of this month, Office's as well -- updates and hotfixes would be added to the packages. The program supported Windows 2000, XP, Vista, and Server 2003. This month, Kaladis and his team of volunteers added support for Office XP 2003 and 2007. The Microsoft take-down e-mail was posted to the Neowin.net forum that AutoPatcher used for its user support. "Microsoft has received information that the domain listed above [www.autopatcher.com/downloads/], which appears to be on servers under your control, is offering unlicensed copies of, or is engaged in other unauthorized activities relating to copyrighted works published by Microsoft," the e-mail read. "We hereby give notice of these activities to you and request that you take expeditious action to remove or disable access to the material described above, and thereby prevent the illegal reproduction and distribution of this software via your company's network," it continued after listing various versions of Windows and Office. The e-mail was signed by a Peter Anaman, a Microsoft Internet investigator. Users of AutoPatcher were, not surprisingly, hot. "I cannot believe that Microsoft did this," Andrew Lucas said in a response to Kaladis' posting of the news. "You are providing a service Microsoft refuses to do. It has now been over 3 years since Microsoft released SP2 for XP." "The end of AutoPatcher is the end of my use of any Windows product, period," swore a user identified only as KMan. Other users -- lots of others -- literally swore at Microsoft in the comments attached to Kaladis' post or on the Neowin forum. More than a few however, took a more c'est la guerre approach to AutoPatcher's demise. "I don't get why everyone is so annoyed, I'm shocked AutoPatcher was allowed to continue for so long in the first place. Is anyone really surprised by this?" asked a user calling himself kudos in a post to Neowin. Microsoft has dealt similar cease-and-desist orders to other patch-related Web sites or services in the past. In April, it leaned on Hotfix.net, whose operator, Ethan Allen, had posted more than 100 hotfixes he expected would be part of Vista SP1. Coincidentally, Vista SP1 was talked up by Microsoft today. Allen also complied by yanking the download. Microsoft did not respond to a request for comment. Computerworld is an InfoWorld affiliate.
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p2pnet.net News:- Four ex-Microsoft employees from the Seattle-area have been charged with stealing software worth $32.4 million from the company.
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(InfoWorld) - Microsoft has blamed an unspecified server problem for a 19-hour stretch during which paying users of Windows XP and Vista were accused by the company's WGA (Windows Genuine Advantage) validation system of running pirated software. Any Vista system fingered during the episode was stripped of some features, including the operating system's Aero graphical interface. As of Saturday at 3 p.m. EDT, Microsoft said the problem had been fixed. "We are aware it is a server-side issue," said Phil Liu, a Microsoft program manager in the WGA group. "[But] the cause is unknown at this current time." "Customers who received an incorrect validation response can fix their system by revalidating on our site," said Alex Kochis, senior product manager of WGA, in a blog posting. The site Kochis referred to is the Genuine Microsoft Software home page, which includes links to validation tests for Windows and Microsoft Office. "After successfully revalidating, any affected system should be rebooted to ensure the genuine-only features are restored," Kochis continued. The validation server snafu began sometime prior to 8 p.m. EDT on Friday, when users started posting messages on Microsoft's support forums, including Vista Validation Issues, saying that their PCs had been tagged as running nongenuine Windows. Overnight, the number of users adding their accounts to the tale spiked significantly, as did the frustration index. "What in hell is going on, Microsoft?" asked a user named Hedgemeister. "SUPPORT? Where are you? Validation issues with Vista. Hello? All of us need help," wrote Gnrlbzik. "This is an absolute disgrace. Treating legitimate customers like criminals is a great way to make people want to buy your software in the future! [I'm] absolutely disgusted," added Costanza. Although copies of both Windows XP and Vista were being tagged as counterfeit during the 19 hours, users of the latter were especially incensed. The WGA antipiracy scheme for that operating system disables several features when it thinks the copy is bogus, among them the Aero graphical user interface and ReadyBoost. Early in the outage, several Microsoft customers posted what they said was the text of e-mail they had received from Microsoft support that suggested users sit tight for several days. "I'm sorry to inform you that the Windows Genuine server might be down for few days," the e-mail, attributed to Microsoft Technical Support, said. "I have escalated the issue to our Genuine team, kindly try to validate again on Tuesday 28 Aug 2007." If the message was intended to mollify users, it didn't work. "TUESDAY!?! Yeah, f that," said Nooaah. It wasn't until Saturday around 1 p.m. EDT that a non-anonymous Microsoft manager offered up information. "I guarantee that we're working on this issue right now," said Liu in a post to the forum. "My goal is to identify a FIX for this issue -- afterwards get you all what you are looking for, an explanation and cause. I promise I will have an explanation and resolution as soon as humanly possible." Users' testy relationship with WGA Although Microsoft did not identify the number of affected systems Saturday, based on the user comments and Liu's promises, it appeared to be systemwide. If so, it would be the biggest problem so far in the developer's contentious WGA program. Designed to spot pirated copies of its Windows and Office software, WGA has been mandatory since mid-2005 before nonsecurity updates or files can be downloaded from Microsoft's site. WGA has faced criticism almost since its inception, but until Friday, the most vocal complaints dated back to June 2006, when users discovered that the Windows XP version of WGA was "phoning home" to Microsoft every time the PC was booted. Those critics returned when Microsoft upped the ante with Vista by replacing the WGA messages that only nagged XP users suspected of running counterfeits with a new policy that used an RFM (reduced functionality mode) to cripple machines. In RFM, only Internet Explorer works, and then for just an hour at a time. Because RFM only allows a grace period of three days to those who previously activated Windows but are subsequently deemed pirates, any problems must be fixed quickly to prevent customers' PCs from going dark. Microsoft managed to beat the deadline. That, however, didn't mean much to some, who said this was it for their relationship with the vendor. One claimed that he was heading out the door to buy a Mac, while others swore they would switch to Linux. Others called on Microsoft to ditch WGA. "Once again the legitimate person gets screwed while the people who pirate software probably aren't even affected," said Mark in the support forum. "This whole validation process should be dropped. This is just another nail in the Microsoft coffin." Saturday's outage was not the first time the validation service has gone dark and then identified all PCs connecting with the servers as running pirated copies. In October 2006, Microsoft's Kochis acknowledged a similar blackout. "Earlier this week, a server on the back end of the WGA service experienced a bug that resulted in a temporary outage. As a result, some systems were incorrectly flagged as being non-genuine, and we want to confirm for those who contacted us about this that it was indeed an error," he wrote.
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Security experts are warning of a new and highly critical security flaw in Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT) Internet Explorer, when running under Windows XP SP2.
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Microsoft&#39;s Passport authentication technology lost a prominent partner this week when eBay announced that it would stop supporting customer logins through Microsoft&#39;s Passport and .
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A software company that Microsoft acquired this week to help beef up computer security may come with a bug of its own--a company claiming ownership of the programs.
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"Limited attacks" are exploiting a previously unknown security bug in Microsoft Word, Microsoft warns.
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Microsoft has rolled out an update to its Windows Genuine Advantage Notifications component, which pops up a notice on the desktop informing users that their operating system is not legitimate. The revision introduces a wizard to improve the installation and validation experience.
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Q: Last week I installed Microsoft Office 2007 and on the same day my spellchecker for outgoing messages in Outlook Express didn't recognize words like "you,""then," and "the," so I became suspicious.
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The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way. It&#39;s like a free ride when you&#39;ve already paid.
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Microsoft has announced a one month &quot;amnesty&quot; of sorts for possessors of possible counterfeit copies of the Windows XP operating system.
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The Office 2004 for Mac update released by Microsoft on Tuesday patched a long-standing bug that erases messages, contacts and other information from Entourage 2004 accounts on Exchange mail servers.
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Microsoft files suit against a company and individuals accused of sending debt relief and porn spam to Hotmail accounts.
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Microsoft temporarily omitted mention of the Mac edition of Office in a write-up that accompanied one of Tuesday's security updates.
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When a hacker going by the name Chujwamwdupe published attack code that exploited a recently patched bug in Microsoft Office 2003 earlier this week, it looked almost as if he were publishing the software out of spite.At the top of his submission, Chujwamwdupe wrote about an e-mail informing him that &quot;Unfortunately, Microsoft has refused to credit you using the name you requested.&quot;&quot;What&#39;s wrong with &#39;chujwamwdupe&#39;, eh?&quot; the hacker asked.Well quite a lot, it turns out, if you live in Poland, where it refers explicitly to a form of sexual intercourse.In the hacker world, where so much rides on reputation, Microsoft had been put into a tough position. The company generally goes out of its way to credit hackers who responsibly disclose software vulnerabilities, and by not crediting Chujwamwdupe, it may have put customers at risk by accelerating the&#160;release of attack code. After all, quickly releasing an exploit is the one way a hacker can back up his claim that he actually discovered the bug in question.Even though the flaw, which lies in the Works File Converter, was&#160;patched the day before the exploit code was released, it will be months before all of Microsoft&#39;s customers install the updates. This means that Chujwamwdupe&#39;s code could be misused by criminals.A member of Microsoft&#39;s security team flagged Chujwamwdupe&#39;s submission, a spokeswoman with Microsoft&#39;s public relations firm said in an e-mail message. &quot;One of them happened to speak the right language and brought the issue to our attention,&quot; she said. &quot;The finder&#39;s user name could have been perceived as offensive in another language, so we credited the vendor, VeriSign iDefense VCP, [Vulnerability Contributor Program] for reporting the issue to us responsibly.&quot;VeriSign pays hackers like Chujwamwdupe for vulnerability information so that it can give its customers better information on the bugs when Microsoft finally patches them. And while the majority of contributors use their real names, some do use hacker pseudonyms.Usually that&#39;s not a problem, said Matthew Richard, the director of iDefense&#39;s Rapid Response Team. &quot;It really doesn&#39;t come across that often. There really aren&#39;t that many handles that are offensive,&quot; he said. Chujwamwdupe is &quot;one of the very few that I&#39;ve seen,&quot; he added.3Com&#39;s TippingPoint division, which also pays hackers for vulnerability information, had to talk researcher Manuel Santamarina Suarez out of using a similarly offensive pseudonym, telling him, &quot;we totally get your originality, but we&#39;re professionals here,&quot; said Terri Forslof, TippingPoint&#39;s manager of security research.According to Forslof, who spent four years working for Microsoft&#39;s Security Response group, there are technical reasons why offensive terms cannot be included in the security bulletins. Such a word might cause the bulletin to be blocked by e-mail or Web-filtering software, she said, making it harder for Microsoft to communicate vital security information with its customers.Still, things would have probably worked out better for all parties if Microsoft and VeriSign had worked out some way to credit the hacker, she said. &quot;If Microsoft would have credited him, would he have felt the need to post that exploit code?&quot;&quot;I believe that there was a communication breakdown here,&quot; she said.&#160;
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Free migration tools and improved feature sets have led more than 300 firms representing 2.8 million employees to make the switch from Lotus Notes and Domino to Outlook, exchange and Sharepoint, Microsoft said Monday at the start of the Lotusphere conference.