Unbelievable: Dutch Government made Microsoft agree to keep Microsoft customers vulnerable to fake digital certificates from DigiNotar by postponing Windows Updates for Dutch users. #fail
Posted by jpluimers on 2011/09/06
English translation of the link title below: Dutch Government forces Microsoft to delay Windows Update.
Google Translate of the linked article.
Why? Because it will give the Dutch Government more time to install certificates of which fake copies can exist because of the DigiNotar hack back in July 2011 and the resulting issuance of fraudulent certificates.
This is a big #fail for the Dutch Government.
What the Dutch Government should have done:
Allow people and companies some slack filling in their electronic correspondence with the government (i.e. Tac Forms, filing of legal documents, etc) until the Dutch Government has installed their new (and now hopefully secure) certificates.
By postponing due dates, they can ensure safe communication, now they can’t.
(Edit: since posting the above, I learned that Agentschap NL has given their customers a week more time to supply digital documents).
What users of Microsoft software should do:
For at least a week, don’t use the (embedded) Microsoft Internet Explorer to communicate with the Dutch government, but use an alternative browser and disable the DigiNotar root certificates on your system.
Use the most recent version of Mozilla Firefox, Google Chrome, Opera or Apple Safari *and* disable the DigiNotar root certificates.
This post explains how to disable the DigiNotar certificates on OS X.
This post explains how to disable the DigiNotar certificates on Windows.
Keep an eye on the DigiNotar post by Joshua Long as he updates it frequently.
Note that on Windows there is s truckload of software that embeds Microsoft Internet Explorer, so you should try to block the iexplore.exe process whenever possible.
–jeroen
Via: Overheid dwingt bij Microsoft vertraagde Windows Update af | Pro | Tweakers.net Nieuws.
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