Explosive errors in Microsoft software

Serious security holes account for 70% of these, but it is still too early to draw any conclusions.

Source: Mobilitistyle As soon as the king of Microsoft empire - Bill Gates - just "abdicated", Microsoft faced a startling report from McAfee.

According to the data collected by the security company, within the first 5 months of 2006, Microsoft had to patch up to 36 critical vulnerabilities in its software, up to 70% over the same period. last year.

However, in an email sent to VNunet, Microsoft still insists that the increased number of serious vulnerabilities is not a "trend", not a "worrying trend" like McAfee's worries.

Microsoft added that its goal was to cut the number of security holes in products to the maximum, as they did successfully with software such as Windows Server 2003 and SQL Server 2005.

The software giant has also ruled out that it is the competition held by security firms like iDefense and TippingPoint that contributes to the explosion of this vulnerability.

iDefense often organizes quarterly competitions, in which the vulnerability hunters can earn up to $ 10,000 if any serious vulnerabilities are found. This year's first quarter competition is aimed at Microsoft products.

According to iDefense spokesperson, this contest saw the highest number of "caught" errors in its history. Three of these have been patched by Microsoft in the security newsletter released last week. The person who discovered the critical error in the ART image file format received $ 10,000 immediately.

However, iDefense also agreed with Microsoft that it is too early to draw any conclusions about the number of "explosive" security holes in Microsoft software.

TippingPoint and iDefense are just two cases where the government organizes competitions to detect security holes, but it is believed that there is a black market running wildly, specializing in exchanging and buying and selling information of type. this. Criminals often come here to try to steal identity, fraud and attack the system.

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