Windows XP To Block Use Of "Troublesome" Drivers

Johnno74 writes "According to this story on The Register, Windows XP rc2 now includes the ability for Microsoft to prevent users from installing certain device drivers. Sounds like a good idea? Well, apparently among the casualties are ZoneAlarm and BlackIce... Two popular free personal firewall products for windows. Guess What? XP includes its own firewall ... So you don't really need then anyway, right? The full details on how this works are in this 1mb word document on Microsoft's site.

The document details how XP will automatically download the latest drivers for your hardware from the windows update site, and more worringly, XP will reguarly update the list of blocked drivers from the site. Quote from the document:

&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp"On a related note, Windows XP provides the ability for Microsoft to receive crash dump data on specific drivers (i.e. when a user receives a blue screen, we upload that information for further analysis). When Microsoft reporting systems indicate crashes have exceeded a certain threshold, Microsoft will notify the Vendor that the device is being considered for the blocked driver list. If reports pass an even greater threshold, we will then flag that specific version of the driver as needing to be blocked."

Boy, The site that uploads that crash dump data (and whatever else it snags...) better have a lot of bandwidth... ;-) As The Register points out, this brings back memories of how Microsoft killed Caldera DR-DOS by deliberately crashing Windows 3.1 if you were running on DR-DOS -- for no reason other than forcing you to use MS-DOS."

Note: according to this article, the change does not prevent Black Ice or other programs from running per se -- but it does require them to use updated versions tailored for XP.

Comments

utter hypocrisy

[Anonymous Coward]

slashdot tells everybody to grab the newest mozilla builds which has talkback, and everybody cheers, because the data will only help make mozilla more bug-proof.
now microsoft wants to do this, and they are evil incarnate.

amazing.

.

Re:I should install what I want on my PC, period.

[slykens]

Because MS feels safer with Dubya's administration

(Moderators: Read ENTIRE message first)

[RANT]Since we're throwing stones here, is this anything like the Chinese spies feeling safer when Clinton was in office? Hell, they didn't even have to spy, he sent them the information they wanted!

This is a technical discussion, asshole, not a political debate. You seem like a socialist little monkey whore who can't figure out that in America we work for the things we get and we compete with each other to do better. Don't like it? Move to China, I hear the state loves control there. Wha? Don't like China's political climate? Our style of government (used to) exist(s) solely because government is retricted in it's functions. Under the laws as they were when the USA was created Microsoft couldn't be prosecuted. Government involvement in anything is BAD! It doesn't matter how beneficial the outcome.[NO RANT]

That said, I'll be the first to agree that Microsoft has competed more than unfairly on oft-occasion, but I don't think who is in the White House makes a difference to them. They're after money and the court's decision just didn't have enough teeth to slow them down. They know they can tie it up in appeals for a few years and by then it won't matter. The only way to fix this problem is to avoid purchasing Windows XP at all costs. I don't plan on using WinXP anywhere in my company, and refuse to allow it to be introduced to our network. I think I can hold out for a few years running Win2k, avoiding the purchase of WinXP. If others do the same then Microsoft will get the message that we don't want XP the way it is. The key is to communicate to Microsoft in their language, the almighty dollar. The only way to accomplish this is to market anti-Microsoft as strong as MS does pro-Microsoft. There needs to be a group that actively attacks Microsoft in the public eye as well as Microsoft attacks their competitors. An example given in another article was asking why all the coverage of 'Code Red' makes it seem that Microsoft is the golden knight who released a patch to fix this problem. What they don't mention in that Microsoft created the problem, and released the patch 45 days before the worm hit, and that if it had been reasonably secure to begin with we wouldn't have this problem. Another example would be detailed press releases explaining how these decisions by Microsoft could be anti-consumer, but more importantly how they could be anti-business or cost business more money to support. The boss doesn't care that we have to buy certain brands of computer parts, but he will care that the price is inflated 25% because of the manufacturers paying MS to be 'approved'. (Which is something I think we all see this leading to) We need to create outrage amongst the average people. Otherwise they are like sheep to the slaughter and will continue to buy buy buy just as fast as MS can say, "Umm, you need this."

Free?

[tetrad]

among the casualties are ZoneAlarm and BlackIce, Two popular free personal firewall products

Don't know about ZoneAlarm, but BlackIce isn't free. It costs $40.

Re:Improve "reliability"

[JediTrainer]

We HAD NT systems here that ran for almost 5 years, with reboots only for service packs and hotfixes.

That's not much of a feat if you consider that the damned things get released about every second day.