Full Disclosure mailing list archives
Re: Perhaps it's time to regulate Microsoft as Critical Infrastructure?
From: Kurt Buff <kurt.buff () gmail com>
Date: Tue, 26 Jan 2010 17:26:01 -0800
On Mon, Jan 25, 2010 at 14:11, <Valdis.Kletnieks () vt edu> wrote:
On Mon, 25 Jan 2010 20:03:03 -0200, Rafael Moraes said:This is a subject that need to be discussed very carefully. I agree, It should be "controlled", but, how far?In particular, one must be *very* careful to not create unintended consequences. For instance, in general the more regulated an industry is, the more risk-adverse the companies get - both because regulation implies "don't rock the boat" and the second-order effects of compliance paperwork and similar issues. Look at the mountains of paperwork needed to get the FAA to type-certify a new airplane as airworthy - what if Microsoft had to do that level of detail for Windows 8, the next release of Exchange, and the next release of Office? How do you make Microsoft "regulated" in any meaningful sense, and still allow them the ability to ship an out-of-cycle patch?
That's one issue. There are others. The real issue, though, is not "how to regulate MSFT". It's how to level the playing field. Best way I can think of to do that is to specify document formats, and make them available to all. ODF may not be the right format, but it's in the right direction. If government(s) were to specify that any software they buy needs to read and write a particular set of formats, with the specifications of those formats publicly available for no more than the cost of copying them, and that they would only accept documents in those formats, then anyone could build software that meets those specifications. Then you'd see a more competitive environment. Kurt _______________________________________________ Full-Disclosure - We believe in it. Charter: http://lists.grok.org.uk/full-disclosure-charter.html Hosted and sponsored by Secunia - http://secunia.com/
Current thread:
- Re: Perhaps it's time to regulate Microsoft as Critical Infrastructure?, (continued)
- Re: Perhaps it's time to regulate Microsoft as Critical Infrastructure? Christian Sciberras (Jan 24)
- Re: Perhaps it's time to regulate Microsoft as Critical Infrastructure? Bipin Gautam (Jan 24)
- Re: Perhaps it's time to regulate Microsoft as Critical Infrastructure? omg wtf (Jan 25)
- Re: Perhaps it's time to regulate Microsoft as Critical Infrastructure? Rafael Moraes (Jan 25)
- Re: Perhaps it's time to regulate Microsoft as Critical Infrastructure? Rafael Moraes (Jan 25)
- Re: Perhaps it's time to regulate Microsoft as Critical Infrastructure? Valdis . Kletnieks (Jan 25)
- Re: Perhaps it's time to regulate Microsoft as Critical Infrastructure? Christian Sciberras (Jan 25)
- Re: Perhaps it's time to regulate Microsoft as Critical Infrastructure? Rafael Moraes (Jan 26)
- Re: Perhaps it's time to regulate Microsoft as Critical Infrastructure? Christian Sciberras (Jan 26)
- Re: Perhaps it's time to regulate Microsoft as Critical Infrastructure? Rohit Patnaik (Jan 26)
- Re: Perhaps it's time to regulate Microsoft as Critical Infrastructure? Kurt Buff (Jan 26)
- Re: Perhaps it's time to regulate Microsoft asCritical Infrastructure? Anders Klixbull (Jan 29)