The Backdoor to Microsoft Windows

In researching the stunning pervasiveness of spying by the government, I ran across the fact that the FBI wants software programmers to install a backdoor in all software. Digging a little further, I found a 1999 article by leading European computer publication Heise which noted that the NSA(National Security Agency) had already built a backdoor into all Windows software.

A careless mistake by Microsoft programmers has revealed that special access codes prepared by the US National Security Agency have been secretly built into Windows. The NSA access system is built into every version of the Windows operating system now in use, except early releases of Windows 95 and its predecessors. The discovery comes close on the heels of the revelations earlier this year that another US software giant, Lotus, had built an NSA “help information” trapdoor into its Notes system, and that security functions on other software systems had been deliberately crippled.

Two weeks ago, a US security company came up with conclusive evidence that the second key belongs to NSA. Like Dr van Someren, Andrew Fernandez, chief scientist with Cryptonym of Morrisville, North Carolina, had been probing the presence and significance of the two keys. Then he checked the latest Service Pack release for Windows NT4, Service Pack 5. He found that Microsoft’s developers had failed to remove or “strip” the debugging symbols used to test this software before they released it. Inside the code were the labels for the two keys. One was called “KEY”. The other was called “NSAKEY”.

Within the Microsoft organisation, access to Windows source code is said to be highly compartmentalized, making it easy for modifications to be inserted without the knowledge of even the respective product managers. Researchers are divided about whether the NSA key could be intended to let US government users of Windows run classified cryptosystems on their machines or whether it is intended to open up anyone’s and everyone’s Windows computer to intelligence gathering techniques deployed by NSA’s burgeoning corps of “information warriors”.

According to Fernandez of Cryptonym, the result of having the secret key inside your Windows operating system “is that it is tremendously easier for the NSA to load unauthorized security services on all copies of Microsoft Windows, and once these security services are loaded, they can effectively compromise your entire operating system“. The NSA key is contained inside all versions of Windows from Windows 95 OSR2 onwards.

Depending on the facts i found out while i was searching a truthful information about this annoying and irritating thing of being totally watched by NSA, i couldn't even get one helpful solution for removing  this and it really scares me because i feel there is no such thing called privacy in all windows operating system anymore no matter whether we are using Windows 95 OSR2 or Windows 8; so here is my advice to you if you really need granted privacy and you are afraid by being compromised you better use Linux or Mac by saying that i don't hate Windows even i am publishing this post using Windows 8 Pro but that is the truth since theirs a backdoor open on all windows versions.

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Yusuf is a freelancer and a friendly junior web and software developer, usually involves with the modern technology innovations and updates. Blogging and sharing bright ideas are his hobbies.