Microsoft Denies HTTPS Shutdown Was Intentional 69
jbrodkin writes "Microsoft acknowledged that Hotmail's HTTPS encryption service was shut off for users in some countries, but denied that it was because of an intentional ploy to limit email security in countries that have experienced anti-government protests and limits on freedom of expression. 'We do not intentionally limit support by region or geography and this issue was not restricted to any specific region of the world,' Microsoft said. Syria, Morocco, Bahrain, Iran, Lebanon, Jordan and Algeria were among the affected countries, but the problem is now resolved."
Fool me once, shame on you... (Score:4, Informative)
...but Microsoft is trying to fool us twice [nytimes.com]... yeah, shame on us.
Choice quote below, the parallel with this http "bug" is impressive::
When I originally wrote about this issue [bing Chinese search censorship] back in June, Microsoft protested. “From what you described, that’s not the way Bing is supposed to work,” wrote Kevin Kutz, a company spokesman. He said that Chinese speakers at Microsoft could not replicate my results and did not detect this kind of skewed result. I sent screen shots, and then Microsoft acknowledged the issue but said that it was simply a temporary mistake. “It’s a bug,” Kutz told me. Later, he added: “What’s important is it’s getting fixed.” Soon, he said, Bing searches would be the same for Tiananmen and other sensitive subjects, whatever the language.
(Thanks to pushing-robot for originally posting the link on /. here [slashdot.org].