Lab Notes

An investigation by the European Commission will try to determine if Microsoft's new ant-virus and anti-spyware products violate anti-trust statutes. I have mixed feelings: one the one hand, as an ISV, I understand the concern about Microsoft stepping on the toes of other ISVs. On the other hand, many of the businesses complaining have made billions on the security holes present in Windows. If these holes are closed, that's not a bad thing for consumers. I suspect that Microsoft is reluctantly entering the desktop security space — they've wanted to stay out of it, close the holes at the OS level and leave the rest to Symantec and its ilk, but the situation just got too bad, the complaints too overwhelming. Windows is now synonymous with insecurity, and the only company that can rectify that is Microsoft.