What comes after a privacy violation? Of course further violations. I’ve update my list of violations and infringements because of this Heise Article “Anwenderüberwachung durch Microsofts Office-Software”: Here is the full list (free to copy/use): The collection of user data in a Windows 10 based corporate network cannot be prevented by proportional resources.1 With 23,000 to 25,000 data points, a Microsoft Office package collects significantly more metrics than a Windows 10.2 Collecting metrics also includes document content.3 Using mobile devices with O365 or Azure Cloud offerings, Microsoft by Design gets direct access to the mailboxes of local Exchange server instances and stores data (emails, contacts, appointments) unencrypted on its own servers.4 Dependence on Microsoft products, also known as lock-in5, blocks technological progress and increasingly represents a structural disadvantage.6 Microsoft systematically undermines best practice recommendations and EU standards7 in procurement and competition law.8 Microsoft does not manage to explain on what basis it claims its own interests, including the transfer of data to third parties, as a data processor on behalf of a client.9 Microsoft collects users’ work-related habits and provides companies with a detailed, personalized “Productivity Score” for employee monitoring.10 This new addition of employee monitoring is just a recycled version of an existing feature Microsoft has been using internally for years. It is not very surprising that it has now become a product called “Workplace Analytics”. It is a well-known anti-pattern called “Function Creep”.11 Read more

The Microsoft cashcow gets scratches. This is not what I write but what the FAZ writes in its today’s article: “The quasi-monopoly of Office gets scratches”1. Some might say the FAZ has no expertise in IT. Well aactually this could be correct, because their undisputed circle of competence is the economy. But this should make you even more concerned. According to a representative survey by the market research company Nielsen2, Microsoft’s position in its own US home market is now at only 80%, and the trend is continuing to decline. One reason for this development is that more and more people are working online and apps in a web browser are better acessible than their classic, locally installed counterparts. Read more

40.000 Companies in Germany affected The BSI (German Federal Authority for Informationsecurity) warns with the second highest level “orange” (= the IT threat situation is mission critical. massive disruption of regular operations) in the public media1. Around 40,000 companies in Germany alone are affected by several critical vulnerabilities because security updates have not yet been installed2. In fact, Heise speaks of playing Russian roulette3. It’s not without reason that I have been warning for several years now about interlocking internal AD and internet functions like Microsoft does deliberatly. Unfortunately many hang their Exchange server directly “in the Internet” including OWA and EAS without any firewalls, mail gateways or reverse proxies. The normal case is totally negligent: Via port forwarding! Read more

Over the recent days, information leaked out how the UK authorities cope with their reported Corona figures. Due to a “technical problem”, about 16,000 Infected including 50,000 contact persons have somehow “got lost”1. Well actually, they are using a bunch of Microsoft Excel files. Unfortunately, a spreadsheet stops working at 1,048,576 lines. Yesterday evening I listened to “The Bunker” podcast2 with the beautiful title “Orange Hawk Down - plus Dirty Data Returns” and was given the best quote so far: Read more

One more SME customer (approx. 250 users spread over several nationwide locations) is migrating away from Exchange to free and Open Source solution. With the ready-to-use installation of a new Linux mail server I have provided my very modest contribution. The rest of the user and the data transfer will be done by the customer’s own IT department. Users can continue to work in their familiar Outlook and mobile client environment when the new EAS accounts are rolled out “side-by-side” to the existing onces. From one second to another, the switch can be carried out without hassle or downtime just by reconfiguring the reverse proxy and the mail gateway. Time-consuming, cost-intensive and above all “hard” migration paths are no longer necessary. Read more

Today I’ve recieved a Email with following Headers: Arc-Authentication-Results: i=1; mx.microsoft.com 1; spf=none; dmarc=none; dkim=none; arc=none Erhalten: from xxxxxxxx.protection.outlook.com May I ask openly what this “protection” outlook.com server does in the absence of common spam and security features? There are numerous tools in the web for (self-)checking. I usually provide this link and try to lead by example before going into further details like IP-Stripping, pentests or security: https://mxtoolbox.com/domain/jakobssystems.net/ With this in mind, stay healthy! Read more

Today Mike Kuketz published a great article in his blog on Digitization in schools and on educational policy, unfortunately in German only, but worth to read: Bildungswesen: Entlarvung der häufigsten Microsoft-Mythen Have fun reading and a good start to the week! Here are some Power-Quotes: Therefore, only product training courses take place. The expiration date for such trained knowledge will be exceeded by the next update of the user interface and subsequently has to be re-learned. So students do not receive digital competence about how something works from a technical point of view, but rather which “buttons” they have to press. Read more

I really just wanted to show you this Fnord, which is a very Microsoft-like thing: Well however, you might ask why I am tackling with Outlook 2019, let me please explain. A company with 40 mailboxes has decided to abandon its Exchange server. The following sentence is for all accountants and auditors: We are talking about cost-savings of 15-25% per year! Now everything runs with common internet standards on a Debian 10 with all the comfort and convenience as before: Starting with EAS-ActiveSync for Outlook (sigh if it has to be), a great webmailer, public folders, calendars, contacts and even resources. Here are some more screenshots: Read more