I found this thing somewhere and saved it.
A global positioning on Windows and other OS's.
Hidden Connections Microsoft Windows XP connects with other computers, or expects to be allowed through the user's firewall, in more than 16 ways. Network security is something the computer user and the operating system supplier need to do together. Microsoft seems to show little sensitivity to the user's security needs. It is expensive to evaluate the present privacy and security vulnerabilities of these connections and impossible to evaluate the future vulnerabilities.
The issue is not that the connections are always bad for the user. The issue is that Microsoft has moved from making operating systems that are independent to making operating systems that are dependent on its own computers, and dependent on having access through the firewall. Besides possible privacy and security vulnerabilities, this new policy raises numerous concerns. For example, if Microsoft decided to remove the
support for Windows XP, users might be forced to upgrade. Or, Microsoft could decide to ask for monthly payment for the use of its computers. Windows 98 does not connect to Microsoft's computers. Microsoft Windows 98 runs completely independently of other computers. Windows XP connects to Microsoft's computers, or expects to be allowed through the user's firewall in at least 16 ways.Microsoft Windows XP is dependent for its operation on other computers that the user does not own and cannot control.
Here is a (probably incomplete) list of ways Windows XP connects each user's computer to Microsoft's computers, or expects to be allowed through the user's firewall:
Application Layer Gateway Service (Requires server rights.)
Fax Service
File Signature Verification
Generic Host Process for Win32 Services (Requires server rights.)
Microsoft Direct Play Voice Test
Microsoft Help and Support Center
Microsoft Help Center Hosting Server (Wants server rights.)
Microsoft Management Console
Microsoft Media Player (Tells Microsoft the music and videos you like. See the February 20, 2002 Security
Focus article Why is Microsoft watching us watch DVD movies?
http://online.securityfocus.com/archive/1/257283
[securityfocus.com].)
Microsoft Network Availability Test
Microsoft Volume Shadow Copy Service
Microsoft Windows Media Configuration Utility (Setup_wm.exe, sometimes runs when you use Windows Media Player.)
MS DTC Console program
Run DLL as an app (There is no indication about which DLL or which function in the DLL.)
Services and Controller app
Time Service, sets the time on your computer from Microsoft's computer. (This can be changed to get the time from another time server.) There are other ways that Microsoft keeps control: Microsoft Office keeps a number in each file you create with Visual Basic macros that identifies your computer. Microsoft Office 97 keeps an identifying number even if there are no macros. (The free and excellent Open Office
http://www.openoffice.org [openoffice.org] does not have this problem, even when it uses the Microsoft file formats.
Microsoft mouse software has reduced functionality until you let it connect to Microsoft computers. This is not a complete list. There are other issues. For example, Microsoft has invented a new protocol, for example, one that bypasses present firewalls. The new protocol isn't documented in this article yet. To generate the above list yourself, disable Microsoft's firewall and use the Zone Labs
http://www.zonelabs.com
[zonelabs.com] ZoneAlarm firewall, which is free for personal use. The free version is located at the link Download FREE ZoneAlarm
http://www.zonelabs.com/store/conten...eDownload.jsp.
(Note that Ad-Aware
http://www.lavasoftusa.com/ is considered the best spyware removal program, and it is free.)
When Windows XP tries to connect to Microsoft, ZoneAlarm will display a dialog box asking whether that is okay. If you say no to some of the requests, some functions of Windows XP will not work (such as networking). An article from Microsoft called Managing Automatic Updating and Download Technologies in Windows XP
http://www.microsoft.com/WindowsXP/p...ageautoupdate/ [microsoft.com] mentions 11 ways in which Windows XP components automatically download software from Microsoft computers. The article says, "Outlined below is a list of components, applications, and technologies discussed in this whitepaper that have the
ability to automatically download and install updated software and information from the Internet." Note that this does not say that the 11 are the only ways that Microsoft XP connects with Microsoft's computers. It says that the 11 are the only ones "discussed in this whitepaper". The Microsoft article tells how to disable the hidden downloading. However, the disabling is very time-consuming. Also, Microsoft has a history of using defect fixes and security fixes to change the operating system settings. This means that all the settings would need to be checked after every defect fix or security vulnerability fix.
Why so many defects? The fact that Windows XP makes your computer dependent on Microsoft computers is bad not only because you lose control over your computer, but because Microsoft produces defective software and doesn't patch defects quickly.
For example, on December 9, 2002, there were 19 security vulnerabilities
http://www.pivx.com/larholm/unpatched/ [pivx.com] in Microsoft's internet browser, Microsoft Internet Explorer. Some of these defects allow a malicious web site designer to "execute arbitrary commands, read local files, and do anything the user can ... do to his machine". Here is the recent record. The list of defects has been similar for years. Also, this is a record only of security defects, not all defects:
June 18, 2002: 18 vulnerabilities
August 8, 2002: 22 vulnerabilities
September 9, 2002: 19 vulnerabilities
November 19, 2002: 32 vulnerabilities
December 9, 2002: 19 vulnerabilities. (Microsoft fixed 15 on Nov. 20, but two new ones were found.) This is a terrible record for a company that has $40 billion in the bank. Obviously, with that kind of money, Microsoft could fix the defects if it wanted to fix them. Since the defects are very public and Microsoft has the money, it seems reasonable to suppose that top management at Microsoft has deliberately decided that some
defects should remain. The defects in Internet Explorer are examples in only one program. All of Microsoft's software seems to be of comparable quality. See, for example, the Microsoft Crash Gallery
http://www.scorpioncity.com/mscrash.shtml.
The security vulnerabilities are often very public. For one of many examples, see the December 21, 2001 Associated Press article published by USA Today, XP flaw due to 'buffer overflow'
http://www.usatoday.com/life/cyber/t...-overflows.htm [usatoday.com]. There are a variety of plausible reasons why Microsoft would allow so many defects in its software. Since Microsoft has a virtual monopoly, it is enormously profitable to sell users sloppily written software, and then later
sell them upgrades to that software. It also seems possible that there is a connection between the huge number of defects and the U.S. government's friendly treatment of Microsoft's law-breaking
http://www.usdoj.gov/atr/cases/f3800/msjudgex.htm [usdoj.gov]. The U.S. government's CIA and FBI and NSA departments spy on the entire world, and unpatched vulnerabilities in Microsoft software help spies.
Another theory is that the quality of management at Microsoft is so poor that the company simply cannot motivate its programmers to do better. One of the causes of security vulnerabilities is called "unchecked buffer", in which a program takes input, but does not check the input before it is used. A search using the Google search engine for
web pages at Microsoft sites exclusively about "unchecked buffer"
http://www.google.com/search?q=unche...:microsoft.com
shows hundreds of entries. This and other indicators suggest that Microsoft may have for years allowed its programmers to submit sloppy programming, and now problems are difficult to find and fix.
NEXT (Your post is more then 10000 characters long, this caused me to have a long good laugh, sorry folks)
NEXT1
A government that uses Microsoft software is not an independent government. Any government that wants to be independent of the United States government, and any government that represents itself as controlled by its own people, cannot use Microsoft operating systems or other Microsoft proprietary systems. This because Microsoft won't allow customers to see the source code of its software. The "source code" of software is the instructions to the computer that the programmer writes. Most software companies, not just Microsoft, have been unwilling to show anyone their source code because they feel that would help someone else make a competing product. However, now governments are beginning to recognize the problems. Presently, the biggest problem is that a government cannot know what is in proprietary software. Accepting proprietary software is equivalent to accepting outside control. The government of the United Kingdom (England, Scotland, Northern Ireland, and Wales) is considering these
issues, also. A policy called Open Source Software, Use within U.K. Government
http://www.ogc.gov.uk/index.asp?id=2190 issued on July 15, 2002 by the U.K. Office of Government Commerce says, (Scroll down almost to the bottom of the page; there is no need to use the links.) "Security of government systems is vital. Properly configured OSS can be at least as secure as proprietary systems, and OSS is currently subject to fewer Internet attacks. A balance needs to be struck between the availability of security administration skills and the advantages of many diverse systems. In some cases mainstream proprietary products may be significantly less secure than open source alternatives (see Gartner report Nimda Worm shows you can't always patch fast enough dated 19/9/01 by John Pescatore)."
In the United States, Microsoft has considerable political power. It has been estimated that the cost to U.S. businesses for only four Windows-based infections, Nimda, Code Red, SirCam and Love Bug, was about $13 billion. These infections were possible because of the unusually poor security design of Microsoft Windows. No
other operating system has had such vulnerability. However, the U.S. government seems to be taking little or no action to correct the problem. One reason may be that there is an unusually close relationship between Microsoft and top U.S. government agencies. For example, Howard Schmidt, vice chairman of the White House's National Critical Infrastructure Protection Board, was previously Microsoft's chief security officer. Scott Charney, Microsoft's current security officer, is a former federal official.
"The larger question, which the [U.S.] government seems to be ignoring, is, why aren't we looking at the problems caused by a monoculture, a single operating system which serves as a single point of failure on the Internet? If there are 60,000 Windows viruses, fewer than 100 Mac viruses, and maybe a dozen Unix viruses, why aren't the problems with Windows an issue?"
The U.S. Department of Justice maintains an index of the current case, United States v. Microsoft Current Case
http://www.usdoj.gov/atr/cases/ms_index.htm [usdoj.gov].
The case was decided on November 1, 2002. Section J on page 7 of the final decree, which begins "No provision of this Final Judgment shall", is interpreted by most technically knowledgeable people to mean that basically there is no penalty for Microsoft, because all of Microsoft's abusive behavior is allowed.
Because of the common perception that Microsoft has broken U.S. law and yet not been forced to pay a significant penalty, there is considerable resentment of Microsoft. Microsoft is considered by many to have participated in corrupting the U.S. government, partly through giving money to politicians
http://www.opensecrets.org/industrie...ib.asp?Ind=B12 [opensecrets.org]. The outcome of the case may increase the distrust of Microsoft and hasten the rate at which companies change to other operating systems, such as RedHat Linux
http://www.redhat.com/ and Mandrake Linux
http://www.linux-mandrake.com/en/, and other office software, such as the excellent (free!!!) Open Office
http://www.openoffice.org [openoffice.org].
Companies don't want to use software from an organization that is not trustworthy because software can be programmed to have hidden operations. Mandrake and RedHat Linux and Open Office are publicly designed and supported software, and are completely free.
The anti-trust case was started partly because of Microsoft's aggressive actions toward Netscape, a company that made an Internet browser and Internet server software. It is interesting to note that Microsoft lost that contest anyway. Many people consider that Mozilla
http://www.mozilla.org/ is the best browser and e-mail software, and that Apache
http://www.apache.org/ [apache.org] is the best Internet server software. These are both publicly supported, free programs. Apache server is the most popular Internet server software in the world.
Wanting more control, and a desire for control that cannot be controlled, is a common psychological problem. For example, dictators of governments often test the limits until they destroy themselves.
There is no need to apologize for using Microsoft software, as many people do who know a lot about computers. The correct solution to abuse is persuading the abuser to stop being abusive. Rather than feel embarrassed because Microsoft is abusive, action needs to be taken to prevent the abuse. If you protest effectively against Microsoft abuse, you are not against Microsoft; you are more pro-Microsoft than Bill Gates.
December 10, 2002, by Michael Jennings
There are much more interesting titbits to harvest in:
http://www.hevanet.com/peace/microsoft.htm
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Well, this page is spitfull of possible fixes to Microsoft 98, ME, 2000 and SP PROBLEMS! :
http://www.users.qwest.net/~careyh/fixes.htm :
Problem: My firewall (zone alarm) is telling me that explorer.exe is trying to connect to 239.255.255.250 port 1900. Anybody know anything about this?
Possible Solution: Take a look at this MSKB article, it may help.
Q262458 - Description of Universal Plug and Play Features in Windows Me
http://support.microsoft.com/support.../Q262/4/58.asp
Q276507 - How to Enable the Universal Plug and Play Feature in Windows Millennium Edition
http://support.microsoft.com/support.../Q276/5/07.asp
OFFCOURSE, you should do this:
http://grc.com/UnPnP/UnPnP.htm
And then you find out that this 239.255.255.250 IP nr is still very much wanted by your Win OS, so then you block that whole address in ZoneAlarmPro. I know you all are very knowledgeable computer users by now, so good luck. LT/