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Microsoft: Malware infections are user's fault
Ben Furfie May 16 2008, 11:53am
Comments (1)
Evangelist Kleef states that Vista is most secure OS yet and attacks are the fault of user attitudes
Microsoft has blamed user "complacency"f for the majority of malware infections in the most verbal attack against the operating system's detractors since its launch.
The comments from Microsoft evangelist Michael Kleef come less than a week after the chief executive of PC Tools Simon Clausen stated that Vista is more susceptible to malware than the eight-year old OS Windows 2000.
Kleef, writing in a Technet blog post, rebuffed Clausen's comments and said that PC Tools figures were more representative of poor user habits and behavior than weaknesses in Vista's security.
"The number of virus infections found by a virus vendor does not necessarily equal poor security. In many cases it equals poor user behaviour. If I, despite all prompting and consent behaviour, choose to go to a (probably dodgy) website, accept the ActiveX control prompts to download (probably dodgy) code and I actually choose to execute that code then I'm hosed."
He added that complacency was a major factor in many infections and that users' 'it-won't-happen-to-me' attitude had to change if the number of malware attacks were to decrease.
Via: Silicon.com
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Comments
“Mixed message”
Posted by: John T - May 18, 10:23pm
In some ways he (Kleef) is right, and in others absolutely, totally, out of touch with reality.
Quite likely most malware infections are a consequence of overly trusting users doing things they shouldn't, BUT... If Microsoft had done their job properly it would not even be possible for a malware infection to occur. There are other OS's available that are immune to viruses and any other known malware, and have the sort of security built in that Ms has apparently yet to even imagine.
As for Vista, most of the alleged security improvements it is claimed to have seem to be an adaptation for the home user of features that have been present in the 'professional' versions since NT3.51...
If you ensure that the account you normally use does NOT have administrator privilege, most malware does not have the ability to infect system files.