WSUS suddenly installed Skype on 06/27/12
Question
Answers
All replies
-
Looks like Microsoft and the US/Israeli government are testing out their new cyber warfare campaign.
Could US cyberspies have moles inside Microsoft? (Source)
By Stewart Mitchell
Posted on 15 Jun 2012 at 09:00
US government officials could be working under cover at Microsoft to help the country's cyber-espionage programme, according to one leading security expert.
The warning comes in the wake of the Flame virus that targeted key computers in the Middle East, and in part used confidential Microsoft certificates in order to access machines.
According to Mikko Hypponen, chief research officer at security firm F-Secure, the claim is a logical conclusion to a series of recent discoveries and disclosures linking the US government to 2010's Stuxnet attack on Iran and ties between Stuxnet and the recent Flame attack.
“The announcement that links Flame to Stuxnet and the conclusive proof that Stuxnet was a US tool means that Flame is also linked to the US government,” Hypponen said.
It's plausible that if there is an operation under way and being run by a US intelligence agency it would make perfect sense for them to plant moles inside Microsoft
“This makes you think that this breach of Microsoft's update system was done by the Americans and most likely a US agency, someone like the NSA,” Hypponen said. “That must make Microsoft mad as hell that its most critical system, used by 900 million of its customers, was breached by fellow Americans.”
Obama-FBI-Microsoft collusion: warrantless snooping on the Internet.
(Source)
At a gathering of the American Constitution Society for Law and Policy, Homeland Security’s Janet Napolitano said,
The First Amendment protects radical opinions, but we need the legal tools to do things like monitor the recruitment of terrorists via the Internet."
The fact is both the administration and Microsoft are already betraying the public.
Back in 2008, Microsoft provided the U.S. government a technical “backdoor” to its browser, which serves the majority of users (over 60%). Backdoor access is undetectable by security software—it bypasses normal authentication (passwords, etc.), firewalls and other computer security devices. In other terms, the Department of Justice, Homeland Security, the FBI and other security agencies can already eavesdrop on anyone using Microsoft’s Internet Explorer browser.
In its infinite greed and fierce competitiveness, Microsoft opts for advertising dollars over providing customers easy access to privacy tools--a de facto, covert compromise of our constitutional rights. Although the computer giant has an effective tool (“InPrivate Filtering”), you have to know about it and then turn it on every time you start up the Explorer browser.
Essentially, Microsoft gives snoops, hackers, advertisers, usage trackers and terrorists the upper hand over oblivious users. In its usual self-serving interests, Microsoft claims the company tried to "synthesize" both points of view about privacy,
Microsoft installs Skype without consent (source)
Apparently by mistake, Microsoft's Windows Server Update Services (WSUS) last night deployed a Skype update to Windows clients that had never had the telephony and messaging software installed. This resulted in Skype being installed on these computers.
The issue affects all computers that automatically receive Microsoft's updates via WSUS without explicit administrator approval. After the blunder surfaced publicly, Microsoft marked the update as expired. It is now no longer being deployed by WSUS servers.
Updates via WSUS are becoming increasingly popular in networks where multiple Windows systems need updating. With a WSUS server, administrators can minimise network loads and control which updates will be installed. In this case, the Skype update was deployed as a non-security update.
