CanSecWest and Swiss Federal Institute of Tech Deliver Attacks on the Reality
of Mac Security
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| In back to back press releases with payloads of sensationalized
| misinformation, two apparently unrelated groups launched attacks on Mac OS
| X’s reputation for delivering better real world security for its users
| compared to Microsoft’s Windows. In the first, a contest held at the
| CanSecWest Applied Security Conference, sponsored in part by Microsoft,
| suggested that hacking a MacBook Air was faster than hacking a Sony or
| Fujitsu Windows PC laptop. Thousands of miles away, the Swiss Federal
| Institute of Technology engaged in Vulnerability Numerology to declare that
| Apple’s operating system had fewer promptly patched software vulnerabilities
| compared to Windows. The premise behind both widely publicized stories are
| wrong, here’s why.
|
| [...]
|
| Why Windows Enthusiasts Refute the Truth.
| Similarly, while there are many reasons for various parties to advance the
| idea that Macs are troubled by latent security problems that have made it “as
| bad as Windows” since at least 2003, including:
|
| * security researchers like Miller who are making a career from reporting
| sensational, yet inconsequential vulnerability findings,
| * security think tanks like the Swiss group, who desperately crave the
| attention that a sensationalized report will bring them,
| * columnists and pundits who make a name for themselves by refuting
| reality with carefully cited statistical fallacy, and
| * groups directly sponsored by Microsoft to report the idea that Windows
| is not the most irresponsibly security plagued software in the Universe,
|
| [...]
|
| The corporate media should look past the enormous advertising revenue it
| receives from Microsoft in order to tell the truth and actually inform its
| readers, rather than serving to advertise the importance of declaring
| allegiance to Microsoft in every news story. But of course no one in the
| corporate media needs to listen to someone like me, who is so biased toward
| good technology and fair competition in the market that they can’t see much
| good at all in Microsoft’s criminal actions against its customers, partners,
| and the state of the art itself.
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http://www.roughlydrafted.com/2008/03/28/cansecwest-and-swiss-federal-institute-of-tech-deliver-attacks-on-the-reality-of-mac-security/
There are many examples of this. Appended are just a few, including the
Microsoft memo on "Jihad", which explains how Microsoft views this assault of
rivals.
Related:
NY Times bans Microsoft analysts from Microsoft stories
,----[ Quote ]
| Just days after banning Enderle from discussing Microsoft because
| he has Microsoft as a client, the Times quoted Gartner analyst
| Michael Silver and AMR Research analyst Jim Murphy in a story
| about Microsoft's Windows and Office software.
|
| If the paper would prefer not to quote an analyst who has
| experience with a client, it did a poor job. Silver is Gartner's
| vice president in charge of client computing. Microsoft happens to
| do lots of business with Gartner and also happens to have a
| client-software monopoly. We're guessing that Silver knows
| Microsoft's products well and has direct involvement with the
| company.
|
| And, sure enough, he appears a number of times on Microsoft's
| own site and thousands of times in stories about Microsoft.
|
| Jim Murphy - wait for it - covers Microsoft too and is even more
| prolific than Silver.
|
| [...]
|
| Part of the problem stems from the reticence of companies such as
| IDC and Gartner to reveal their clients. That should make everyone
| nervous, but it doesn't. So called objective technology publications
| keep publishing material bought by vendors without telling you this.
| They're also too lazy or scared to ignore the likes of Gartner and
| IDC until the firms change their disclosure rules.
`----
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2006/12/15/nytimes_ms_ban/
http://antitrust.slated.org/www.iowaconsumercase.org/011607/3000/PX03096.pdf
Has IDC got the wrong number for iPhone?
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| IDC has poured cold water on Apple's iPhone just days after a previous survey
| led M:Metrics to talk up the new entry to the cellphone stakes. But are the
| new numbers sound?
|
| [...]
|
| The most obvious difference is in the sample size. M:Metrics had
| 11,060 respondents, IDC just 456. The sample space was also different,
| with M:Metrics apparently sampling from mobile phone subscribers, while
| IDC looked at online mobile phone shoppers.
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http://www.itwire.com.au/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=13036&Itemid=1054
IDC pronounces Linux unimportant to European economy
http://www.theinquirer.net/default.aspx?article=34542
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