[MLB-WIRELESS] This is scary if it's true <-- on topic! really! well sort of.

[Nath]

Microsoft has already had a go at a proprietary protocol.. ever heard of
NetBEUI ? well, that was microsofts semi successful attempt at a proprietary
protocol. notice how its been phased out of windows XP? though that article
brings up a good point about exploitable TCP/IP stacks. until XP microsoft
had never fully implemented the TCP/IP stack... but who can see the whole
internet crashing because of windows having a real TCP/IP stack finally?
nuff my crap.

----- Original Message -----
From: "Robert Tchia" <robert.tchia at palantir.com.au>
To: <melbwireless at wireless.org.au>
Sent: Monday, July 08, 2002 12:49 PM
Subject: [MLB-WIRELESS] This is scary if it's true


> Don't know if there is any truth in it, but...
>
>
> Robert X. Cringely is easily one of the most well-written and
> shockingly intelligent columnists I've ever read. His latest column
> takes on Palladium, and it sure made me do a double-take. Microsoft
> releasing a proprietary version of TCP/IP? Oh my - smells like trouble
> to me! Go check out the article - very interesting stuff.
>
> "Last August, I wrote of a rumor that Microsoft wanted to replace
> TCP/IP with a proprietary protocol -- a protocol owned by Microsoft --
> that it would tout as being more secure. Actually, the new protocol
> would likely be TCP/IP with some of the reserved fields used as
> pointers to proprietary extensions, quite similar to Vines IP, if you
> remember that product from Banyan Systems. I called it TCP/MS in the
> column. How do you push for the acceptance of such a protocol? First,
> make the old one unworkable by placing millions of exploitable TCP/IP
> stacks out on the Net, ready-to-use by any teenage sociopath. When the
> Net slows or crashes, the blame would not be assigned to Microsoft.
> Then ship the new protocol with every new copy of Windows, and install
> it with every Windows Update over the Internet. Zero to 100 million
> copies could happen in less than a year.
>
> This week, Microsoft announced Palladium through an exclusive story in
> Newsweek written by Steven Levy, who ought to have known better.
> Palladium is the code name for a Microsoft project to make all
> Internet communication safer by essentially pasting a digital
> certificate on every application, message, byte, and machine on the
> Net, then encrypting the data EVEN INSIDE YOUR COMPUTER PROCESSOR.
> Palladium compatible hardware (presumably chipsets and motherboards)
> will come from both AMD and Intel, and the software will, of course,
> come from Microsoft. That software is what I had dubbed TCP/MS.
>
> The point of all this is simple. It may actually make the Internet
> somewhat safer. But the real purpose of this stuff, I fear, is to take
> technology owned by nobody (TCP/IP) and replace it with technology
> owned by Redmond. That's taking the Internet and turning it into MSN.
> Oh, and we'll all have to buy new computers.
>
> This is diabolical. If Microsoft is successful, Palladium will give
> Bill Gates a piece of every transaction of any type while at the same
> time marginalizing the work of any competitor who doesn't choose to be
> Palladium-compliant. So much for Linux and Open Source, but it goes
> even further than that. So much for Apple and the Macintosh. It's a
> militarized network architecture only Dick Cheney could love."
>
> <http://www.pbs.org/cringely/pulpit/pulpit20020627.html>
>
> Taken from... Pocket PC Thoughts
> (http://www.pocketpcthoughts.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=1899)
>
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