The Borg wants to control your PC
Respected InfoWorld colunist Brian Livingston on how Microsoft service pack upgrades to Win 2K can disable other programs on your system without your knowledge.
One thing you can’t get around, however — and a big reason for the latest fears — is Microsoft’s DRM (digital rights management) scheme. This built-in XP feature silently downloads and installs “revocation lists.” These lists prevent “revoked” programs from playing DRM-encoded content.
The idea of giving any outside company the ability to remotely turn off something that previously worked on your computer strikes many as lunacy.
Aside from fair-use issues, users fear silent upgrades because Microsoft has pumped out many buggy patches that themselves needed patching. Just this June, Microsoft shipped the Nimda worm in its Korean edition of Visual Studio .Net.