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Microsoft Removes Antivirus Registry Key Check for Windows 10 Users (bleepingcomputer.com)
Microsoft has backtracked on a decision it took back in January when it conditioned that computers without a special registry key would not receive any more security updates. From a report: That particular "requirement" was introduced as part of the Meltdown and Spectre patching process. At the time, Microsoft said that antivirus vendors would have to add a key to the Windows Registry to signal that they are compatible with Microsoft's original Meltdown and Spectre patches. This was a big issue at the time because Microsoft detected during testing that some antivirus vendors would inject code into parts of the kernel that the company was trying to patch against Meltdown and Spectre flaws.
Can't let users have the power of deciding when to install updates now, can they? Gotta close that loophole. Microsoft knows best.
it does not really sound like a backtrack, but more like we do not need to do this anymore, now that the antivirus programs stopped using those parts of the kernel that the patch needed.
This was a big issue at the time because Microsoft detected during testing that some antivirus vendors would inject code into parts of the kernel that the company was trying to patch against Meltdown and Spectre flaws.
This is really bringing me back to the old days of Microsoft Windows...
Never have Mac and Linux and BSD and well, all other OS users ever been so glad as not to be a part of the Mother of All Cluster Fucks that is Windows. And we were pretty glad before.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
...but screw A/V vendors even more. There are countless devs on huge projects like Firefox and Chrome that talk about how horrible A/V vendors treat your system and even INJECT new vulnerabilities into your system.
https://it.slashdot.org/story/...
https://www.theregister.co.uk/...
How does this affect Windows systems that receive all their updates via WSUS?
Finally, a way to actually turn off updates until we want them in Windows 10 and MS comes back and takes the feature away. Sheesh!
The party of stupid and the party of evil get together and do something both stupid and evil, then call it bipartisan.
what happens then? Guess I gotta brace myself for a wave of new frustrated customers :D
my sig pwns your sig
That if I stay on Win7 and don't add this key, Microsoft will leave me alone unless I manually want to update something? Don't know about you, but this sounds like a really nice feature to me..
Microsoft said they would do one thing and then did another? That's only exactly what they do literally every goddamned time.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
"some antivirus vendors would inject code into parts of the kernel"
That's the more important part of the story.
Antivirus vendors' products are injecting their own code "into parts of the kernel" that Microsoft was trying to patch? And Microsoft allows this?
No third-party software should ever be allowed to patch an OS kernel - any OS kernel. Ever.
(Yes, yes, I know. Kernel patching has been SOP for all kinds of Windows software for decades now. But, c'mon - Windows 10 was supposed to have been designed from the ground up to be secure. Permitting the OS kernel to be patched by third parties, even with user permission required, is a fundamental security design flaw that no OS architect should allow ...
Check out my novel.
Microsoft put the check in place for compatibility reasons. Yet they have clearly said in the article and the original announcement that the reason they are dropping this flag is because their vendors did exactly what the registry key was designed to do: Get vendors to update their software or admit they are leaving users at risk.
Vendors chose to update their software, registry key is now superfluous. That a backtrack doesn't make.