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The email made its way to the Associated Press, and has been widely published in various news media this past week.
Microsoft has announced on more than one occasion that it would pay more attention to the security of its products, but results haven't been all too apparent.
But from reading this email it seems that the company really want to make serious work of securing their software.
The email not only contains phrases such as "When we face a choice between adding features and resolving security issues, we need to choose security," but also more clear text such as "We have done a great job of having teams work around the clock to deliver security fixes for any problems that arise. Our responsiveness has been unmatched -- but as an industry leader we can and must do better. Our new design approaches need to dramatically reduce the number of such issues that come up in the software that Microsoft, its partners and its customers create. We need to make it automatic for customers to get the benefits of these fixes. Eventually, our software should be so fundamentally secure that customers never even worry about it."
Paul Thurrott writes: "Interestingly, employee compensation and bonuses will now be tied to how secure products are, probably the clearest sign that Gates is serious about the new plan" ...it would be, but I have no information confirming this.
Like many others, I would say that it's about time that Microsoft start taking security more serious. I will also say that it will probably take a long time before all of Microsoft products will be 'more' secure (I also don't think that 100% security will be possible). Microsoft's new operating systems consist of millions of lines coding, over 30 million of Windows 2000 & XP if I remember correctly, so debugging them will be a monumental task. Just as well that Windows 95 is no longer supported, and that Windows 98/98 SE and NT 4.x will "retire" by next June year (source).
