Thanks for sendigng this in Blasphemous Girl! Reportedly, Microsoft has been told by the USAF to smarten up on security, or loose a major customer.
A top U.S. Air Force official has warned Microsoft to dramatically improve the security of its software or risk losing the Air Force as a customer. In an interview, Air Force chief information officer John Gilligan revealed he has met with senior Microsoft executives to tell them the Air Force is "raising the bar on our level of expectation" for secure software.
Since being named Air Force CIO in November, Gilligan, who controls a $6 billion-a-year technology budget, also has met with executives from Cisco Systems and delivered a similar message at a handful of industry forums. "We just can"t afford the exposures, and so those who give us better solutions, that"s where we"re going to put our business," Gilligan says.
Gilligan, former Energy Department CIO, has discussed security most often with executives at Microsoft. "They are the biggest supplier to the Air Force, and my attempt has been to encourage them to set an example," he says.
Reacting to rising criticism from the Air Force and others, Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates in mid-January issued a directive making security the software giant"s No. 1 priority.
Gates directed 7,000 programmers to spend February scouring the Windows operating system for openings hackers might exploit to steal data or shut down systems.
"This is what our customers expect and demand," says Steve Lipner, Microsoft"s director of security assurance. "Message received. We"re working night and day on security."