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MS to Pentagon: Stop Defending Our Way of Life (with Open Source Software)
Posted by Jack Balkin on Thursday, May 23 @ 08:45:37 EDT OpenSource
The Washington Post reports that Microsoft has been lobbying the Pentagon to stop employing open source software and to switch to proprietary solutions, like, ... ahem, Microsoft's. (Microsoft Fights Free Software at Pentagon). In a "barrage" of contacts aimed at Pentagon officials, the company has argued that "`open source' software threatens security and its intellectual property," apparently confusing what is good for the country (security) with what is good for Microsoft (maximizing its profits and crushing all open source providers underfoot). Unfortunately for Microsoft, a recent report prepared for the Department of Defense concluded that "open source often results in more secure, less expensive applications and that, if anything, its use should be expanded."

This story is important not merely because Microsoft is once again putting its own interests above those of the public. It's important because it suggests a way to transcend the usual debates about freedom of innovation versus government regulation of technology, as well as debates about the long-term viability of open source versus proprietary architectures. Government contracting is an important but often overlooked way that government officials can promote socially useful business practices without mandating particular technological architectures through law. By acting as a consumer rather than a legislator or regulator, government can create market incentives for open architectures and open source solutions, and help to establish those solutions as industry standards. The best thing that the federal government could do to promote democratic technologies would be to embrace open source and open architectures as the preferred form of technology in all of its government contracts, not just the Pentagon's. Microsoft understands this potential threat to its dominance as well as anyone.

Additional Resources (by Ernest Miller) below:

Slashdot readers are divided over the merits of Microsoft's proposal - Not! (Microsoft Battles Free Software at Pentagon), see also (MS Cites National Security to Justify Closed Source)

The recent report that concluded that open source should be used more extensively does not seem to be online, but was prepared by the Mitre Corporation, a not-for-profit national resource that provides systems engineering, research and development, and information technology support to the government.

The NSA has developed their own "Security-Enhanced Linux", explaining that:

Linux was chosen as the platform for this work because its growing success and open development environment provided an opportunity to demonstrate that this functionality can be successful in a mainstream operating system and, at the same time, contribute to the security of a widely used system.
 
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· Pentagon
· Slashdot
· Microsoft Battles Free Software at Pentagon
· MS Cites National Security to Justify Closed Source
· Mitre Corporation
· NSA
· Security-Enhanced Linux
· More about OpenSource
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"User's Login" | Login/Create an Account | 1 comment
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Why Microsoft is interested... (Score: 0)
by Anonymous (Name Withheld on Advice of Counsel) on Sunday, May 26 @ 09:23:11 EDT
Was reading a study from 1995 that said in 2002 the military/DoD would spend an estimated 20 billion dollars on software solutions.

If Microsoft could land 75% of that pie, instead of the 90% of desktop systems (taking into account some custom software needing to be written), they'd have a huge amount of contracts - plus running up costs, etc.

Peru's way is the only way to go.

-- Ender, Duke_of_URL


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