Another terrorist attack in London
- Thread starter Groff
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Silurian
Deity
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What people rightly or wrongly believe does matter because it affects their reactions.
Also the legal definition of the US intelligence community is different to the agencies of the US that provide intelligence. Drugs are often used by terrorists; I am sure that the DEA will pass on intelligence about terrorists to the relevant agency.
Governments, including the US, have used front companies to gather intelligence. I have no reason to believe that Facebook, Google, Liberty Global and Microsoft are US front companies but it is possible that they gather intelligence without their knowledge or consent.
EnglishEdward
Deity
I agree they are not US government front companies.
But when one is talking about fictious legal personalities such as corporates (and governments), knowlege
and consent is inherently murky in that some individuals may know or consent while others do not.
I doubt that the Chinese or Russian governments care to distinguish between what is the offical,
according to US law definition of, US intelligence commmunity and US corporates, and neither do I.
Kozmos
Jew Detective
Oh they know. They just keep mum about it most of the time, until it's time to play the victims in front of the public. 'the evil guberment forced us and violated you...the consumer'
It doesn't make sense to lump in Microsoft with Facebook and Google from that perspective. Facebook and Google are the world's most powerful ad companies. MS sells actual products and services for money and they bend over backwards to ensure that non-Americans can trust their software.
Kozmos
Jew Detective
Somehow I don't feel like modifying Skype and Windows 10 to satisfy the central Chinese government helps that argument from the regular consumer standpoint.
innonimatu
the resident Cassandra
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Sure... when the spies' tools get released to the public Microsoft suddenly gets very worried to patch the holes about to be disclosed!
That's one datapoint, look at any other country using Windows (e.g. pretty much all of them.) Microsoft would be ruined as a multinational company if they knowingly implemented backdoors in their primary software.
If your argument is about services, rather than software trust, then sure, any company under the jurisdiction of American laws has certain risks, but MS is much closer to Apple with its privacy standpoints than they are to Google or Facebook. Microsoft Corp. v. United States
MS patched those holes before they got released to the public.
Kozmos
Jew Detective
Who's going to prove conclusively that a backdoor was malicious and not incompetence? Ex-employees with potential NDAs? Would they even be ruined? What are people going to do? Switch to another OS? For hosting and servers, some, maybe yeah, but nowhere near enough to ruin MS. No common user is going to ever learn to work on a Linux desktop. (yes I know about Berlin, that was a nightmare in itself) Apple might see some uptick in fortunes, but not with their prices as they are.
Doesn't need conclusive proof, just reasonable suspicion.
The idea that NDAs would stop every employee is ludicrous. Back-door nonsense
Software companies can't compete by limiting their talent pool to people willing to implement backdoors and be quiet about them. That pretty much eliminates the entire pool of competent security professionals.
The idea that NDAs would stop every employee is ludicrous. Back-door nonsense
Software companies can't compete by limiting their talent pool to people willing to implement backdoors and be quiet about them. That pretty much eliminates the entire pool of competent security professionals.
Kozmos
Jew Detective
No, you need conclusive proof. Otherwise it will be shuffled into a listicle of 'incredible programming screw-ups of important stuff'.
Who in their right mind would want to make an enemy of the US government anyway? Lavabit was shut down for it. Good for them. IT professionals are some of the most 'cult of the mercenary' people I've seen. They'll say sure, send me a written e-mail order and pay me double and I'll do what you want. And management does, god bless their simple, avaricious hearts and most of the time it never comes to light.
Who in their right mind would want to make an enemy of the US government anyway? Lavabit was shut down for it. Good for them. IT professionals are some of the most 'cult of the mercenary' people I've seen. They'll say sure, send me a written e-mail order and pay me double and I'll do what you want. And management does, god bless their simple, avaricious hearts and most of the time it never comes to light.
I work for a large non-American enterprise, we'd immediately begin the transition away from Windows on both server and desktop if there was reasonable suspicious that backdoors were present.
If that's your opinion of IT professionals, you should stop working with people like Anthony Levandowski. It's not just a matter of personal morals - it's a matter of simple competence. Support of backdoors is nearly mutually exclusive with the understanding of how security works. It's not a coincidence that backdoors in software products enjoy pretty much universal condemnation by professionals. It would be like trying to hire doctors who don't support the Hippocratic oath or lawyers who don't support the constitution. Sure, they exist, but you're not going to build a successful company by exclusively hiring those.
If that's your opinion of IT professionals, you should stop working with people like Anthony Levandowski. It's not just a matter of personal morals - it's a matter of simple competence. Support of backdoors is nearly mutually exclusive with the understanding of how security works. It's not a coincidence that backdoors in software products enjoy pretty much universal condemnation by professionals. It would be like trying to hire doctors who don't support the Hippocratic oath or lawyers who don't support the constitution. Sure, they exist, but you're not going to build a successful company by exclusively hiring those.
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Kozmos
Jew Detective
I am not disputing that it's bad practice, but I am saying that bad practice is demanded in one form or another by management at worst or disregarded at best because at the end of the day almost everyone shows up at work for short term profit. Yes, some highly focused companies are very competent, moral, professional and forward looking. They are not the norm though. I'd say NA IT is overall more professional than elsewhere in the world, but then I remember they regularly outsource IT support, until our 'please do the needful' friends screw up in a major way, then they bring in the original competent staff and the whole cycle starts again. IT is just like any other industry, except perhaps with an emphasis on lateral mobility.
Yeah, average enterprise IT is pretty dumpy, but MS isn't employing average people.
The lack of short-term profit motivation has actually created a problem for management at MS/Google/Apple/Facebook/Amazon/etc. - they have to pay high salaries to attract and retain good technical talent, but you pretty rapidly end up with people who make enough money after a few years that they don't need the job anymore.
The lack of short-term profit motivation has actually created a problem for management at MS/Google/Apple/Facebook/Amazon/etc. - they have to pay high salaries to attract and retain good technical talent, but you pretty rapidly end up with people who make enough money after a few years that they don't need the job anymore.
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