A French Free Software organization, April, has announced that a German Documentary from the ARD, "The Microsoft Cyber Attack" has been released in English thanks to Deutsche Welle (DW). It is an informative and objective film about the inappropriate relations between a certain infamous corporation and the various public administrations. The documentary first aired on February 19th, 2018 by the German public broadcaster (ARD).
In May 2017, hundreds of thousands of computers running Microsoft Windows operating systems were disabled by the WannaCry cyber attack. How could a single malware program simultaneously cripple companies, hospitals and even government intelligence services all around the globe? Microsoft Windows software programs proved to be their common Achilles heel. Companies and private individuals use software from Microsoft. Government and public administrations from Helsinki to Lisbon run it, too. That makes all of them vulnerable to attacks from hackers and spies. Microsoft Window's dominance also undermines European procurement legislation, impedes technological progress and costs Europe a bundle. Journalist Harald Schumann and his team of Investigate Europe researchers have spoken with insiders and administrators from all across the continent. The German government's former IT director, Martin Schallbruch, tells us how countries are becoming increasingly dependent on Microsoft. A legal expert from the Netherlands describes how the European Commission and governments are breaking European laws regulating public tenders. Hamburg's data protection commissioner, Johannes Caspar, warns that Microsoft Windows systems expose individuals' private data to the prying eyes of US intelligence services. Internal documents show that Germany's Federal Office for Information Security (BSI) suspects this, too. The European Parliament and the German parliament have responded by repeatedly demanding that government IT systems be converted to open source software. Their source codes can be accessed freely and copied at will, which would enable European security services to use, alter and monitor them. Italy's army is going open source, as have police in France, Lithuania, and in the cities of Rome and Barcelona. Why do most governments resist the alternatives, or fall back into Microsoft's clutches, as Munich city authorities did. The EU's Commissioner for the Digital Single Market, Andrus Ansip, and other key players have the answers.
The video itself, « The Microsoft Cyber Attack », is available at Youtube and is about 43 minutes long.
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Another German state plans switch back from Linux to Windows
The German state of Lower Saxony plans to follow Munich's example, and migrate a reported 13,000 users from Linux back to Windows.
Apparently undaunted by the cost of the Munich switch (which we reported in January could be as much as €100m), Lower Saxony is considering making the change in its tax office. The state seems to expect a much cheaper transition, with Heise (in German here) reporting the first-year budget is €5.9m, and another €7m further out.
The tax office argues its decision is driven by compatibility: field workers and teleworkers overwhelmingly use Windows, while the OpenSUSE variants are installed on its office workstations. The office workstations are also ageing and due for replacement, something that helped open the door for Windows.
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German Documentary on Relations Between Microsoft and Public Administration Now Available in English
(Score: 2) by takyon on Tuesday May 29 2018, @09:57AM (10 children)
Here's what happens next:
https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2018/01/menacing-android-botnet-still-thrives-16-months-after-coming-to-light/ [arstechnica.com]
https://thehackernews.com/2018/03/android-botnet-malware.html [thehackernews.com]
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Gaaark on Tuesday May 29 2018, @10:52AM (8 children)
Except Androids not really Linux.
Its linux put in bed with a meth-ed up hooker.
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 29 2018, @11:18AM
FTFY
(Score: 3, Insightful) by choose another one on Tuesday May 29 2018, @12:15PM (6 children)
> Except Androids not really Linux.
I don't think that is the point, the point is that attacks on commonly used software are widespread _because_ it is commonly used. They are also probably more common because widely used software is a bigger more lucrative target.
Q: "How could a single malware program simultaneously cripple companies, hospitals and even government intelligence services all around the globe?"
A: because they were all using the same targeted software. End. Of. Story.
It doesn't matter if the software is open source, "free", sell-your-soul or hand-over-your-firstborn, all software has bugs, all software will be vulnerable, somewhere, somehow. Freedom/openness of source or level of price is no protection - heartbleed and shellshock are ample proof of that.
The real discussion should be where is the best balance between commonality and difference - the former to deliver compatibility and allow working with others, the latter to reduce risk of common vulnerability.
> Except Androids not really Linux.
And Windows Phone is not Linux, really, and it's from the evil Microsoft, and yet as far as I can see Windows Phone 8.x / 10 has zero CVEs, none, ever (and I only found one for WP7). Android and Apple phone OSes both have over a thousand. Are Apple's and Google's coders really thousands of times worse at security? I don't think so.
[Declaration of interest: I use a Windows Phone, for security, incompatibility with everything, and because no one wants to steal it (and because my 10yr old blackberry finally fell apart). Linux desktop for the same reasons...]
(Score: 5, Touché) by Gaaark on Tuesday May 29 2018, @01:49PM (4 children)
and yet the internet runs on linux servers, but the ones that are hacked the most are the remaining windows servers.
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 2) by choose another one on Wednesday May 30 2018, @09:08AM (3 children)
> and yet the internet runs on linux servers, but the ones that are hacked the most are the remaining windows servers.
Source? Oh, forget it I found one: https://www.zdnet.com/article/linux-hacked-more-often-than-windows/ [zdnet.com]
Sorry it says you're wrong.
But that is almost irrelevant - the biggest server attack surface, and the most common target, on the internet today appears to be WordPress (also open source, but I don't think that is relevant).
WordPress and PHP (which it is written in) are frequently derided for being inherently insecure, IMO they aren't (well, PHP possibly), they are simply attacked more often by virtue of their popularity. Windows desktop is the same.
(Score: 2) by Gaaark on Wednesday May 30 2018, @10:23AM (2 children)
You DO know that zd are a shill for MS, right? You ARE that techy?
Hmmmm....
https://www.theregister.co.uk/2002/11/21/why_is_mi2g_so_unpopular/ [theregister.co.uk]
Oh, shit...it gets worse....look at this shite
http://www.mi2g.com/cgi/mi2g/frameset.php?pageid=http%3A//www.mi2g.com/cgi/mi2g/media.php [mi2g.com]
So a shite company says an unnamed 'study' says your dick is small....errrrr...some shit no one else finds....
I guess you're NOT a techy!
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 2) by choose another one on Wednesday May 30 2018, @09:20PM (1 child)
It was just the first relevant report in the searches I did. I could add many more from various other sites and sources or my own stats from searching CVE database in various ways, but why bother when you only want to attack the messenger rather than argue against the message? If you actually have sources to back your claim of the opposite then I'd like to see them, because I am having trouble finding any.
(Score: 3, Informative) by Gaaark on Thursday May 31 2018, @12:44AM
Sure, let me do all the work
https://www.pcworld.com/article/204423/why_linux_beats_windows_for_servers.html [pcworld.com]
AND, from zd itself!
https://www.zdnet.com/article/uks-security-branch-says-ubuntu-most-secure-end-user-os/ [zdnet.com]
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 29 2018, @06:50PM
"Freedom/openness of source or level of price is no protection - heartbleed and shellshock are ample proof of that."
bs. heartbleed just proves that the transition to Free Software is going too slowly. Then free software wouldn't be so dependent on the leaching dinosaurs of the industry. it's true that FOSS licensed software is not a panacea but it's not a zero effect either. slaveware is inherently less secure and the gap will only widen in the future.
(Score: 1) by Deeo Kain on Tuesday May 29 2018, @02:50PM
All major GNU/Linux distributions for the desktop and server market can and are regularly maintained and updated. Even if a distro dies away, you can replace it with another one. A big slice of Android devices instead have long been left unpatched, a lot of Android smartphones and tablets do not get updates after two years or so after they are no longer in production. They run a Linux kernel, but that's the end of the similarities.
(Score: 1) by Deeo Kain on Tuesday May 29 2018, @10:02AM (3 children)
Time to again challenge the IT Robbing Barons in the courts.
ps
Please people, you had a portion of text inadvertently pasted in the middle of a sentence:
that government IT sy
« The Microsoft Cyber Attack » : a German TV (ARD) Documentary on Relations Between Microsoft and Public Administration Now Available in English.stems be converted to open source software.(Score: 2) by takyon on Tuesday May 29 2018, @10:08AM
edited
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 3, Interesting) by martyb on Tuesday May 29 2018, @10:35AM (1 child)
Sadly, the issue with the text is present in the summary at https://www.april.org/en/microsoft-cyber-attack-a-german-documentary-ard-relations-between-microsoft-and-public-administratio [april.org] which was [poorly] copied from the description on the YouTube video at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_wGLS2rSQPQ [youtube.com].
I noticed the issue, as well, and came here independently to fix this, but I see that takyon already took care of it. I thought others might like to know that your tireless editors at SN were not at fault (in this particular case, at least!).
Wit is intellect, dancing.
(Score: 1) by Deeo Kain on Tuesday May 29 2018, @11:17AM
Sorry for putting the blame on you, people!
Thank you for the editing
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 29 2018, @10:36AM (2 children)
From the you-really-couldn't-think-of-a dept.-line-for-this? dept.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Tuesday May 29 2018, @10:39AM (1 child)
Snarked a department up for you.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Tuesday May 29 2018, @05:49PM
from the chair-throwing department
Young people won't believe you if you say you used to get Netflix by US Postal Mail.
(Score: 1) by CZB on Tuesday May 29 2018, @03:26PM (2 children)
Has anyone watched this? Could it possibly be not boring?
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Runaway1956 on Tuesday May 29 2018, @03:38PM
I watched it while the submission was still in the queue. I thought the video was pretty good. It exposes just how dirty MS is, as well as various politicians. The EU seems to have it's own revolving door, with people like Ajit Pai who are give free reign of government offices, in order to advance corporate interests. And, MS has taken advantage of that, in full.
Go ahead and watch it, unless you have ADD. If you have ADD, you might prefer to go play in the traffic. There is no shooting, no explosions, nobody dies onscreen, no jet fighters, no jihadists - your call.
Abortion is the number one killed of children in the United States.
(Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Tuesday May 29 2018, @05:50PM
I watched it when it aired. I definitely was not bored.
Of course that was the German version, so I cannot say anything about the quality of the English translation.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 29 2018, @10:10PM
I don't do google. Probably not as I don't think it's freely licensed...