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Windows Security Through Annoyances?

Posted by timothy on from the must-have-started-as-a-joke dept.

techmuse writes "According to News.com, Microsoft's next version of Windows will let you know that you are looking at (supposedly) secure data by putting personalized text, such as the names of your dogs (a null list in my case), in window borders, and will also hide the data unless the window has no others on top of it. That should make it very usable, and speed adoption of security features -- especially among people who need to be able to see the data in two partially overlapping windows at once."

2 of 387 comments (clear)

  1. Re:So...... by RoLi · · Score: 5, Interesting
    Because any website can pop up a fake window with a little GIF of a lock in the corner.

    How can a website possibly fake the lock-icon which happens to be on the toolbar?

    But those dog names will be stored somewhere secure, that they can't access, so you know if you see them that your own computer is generating that data.

    Actually I think it's either a desperate try to distract users from real security problems (like the millions of servers that get infected each year despite MS being only a minor player on SQL and webservers, or the even more desktops...) or it's a clever plan to complete the big database in Redmond with the last thing they don't know about you yet: The names of your dogs.

    So far, I haven't heard about any "websites faking lock icons and doing nasty stuff", but even though Apache is a much larger target, all big worms hit IIS.

    I think somebody at Redmond still treats security as a 100% pure PR-problem. Just do anything about security, no matter how stupid the idea is, as long as it's from Microsoft, there will always be simple minds that will say:

    Makes sense

    Mod parent up: +1 funny please.

  2. Not how it works, but how it looks. by immanis · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Regardless of how much security this, in reality, will provide, it will provide a tremendous APPEARANCE of security.

    Sure, it may work. It may even work well. But the important thing from a sales standpoint is that it will look very secure. And that sells better than actual security. Given their posturing over security in the past year, this is right in line.

    --

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