Microsoft bites back at Google's Windows snub

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Microsoft has responded to reports that Google is ditching Windows operating systems, claiming its rival may want to look closer to home for security flaws.

Earlier this week it emerged that Google was no longer allowing new employees to use Windows on their work machines and that current staff were being urged to move to Mac or Linux operating systems. Google argued this was due to security vulnerabilities in Windows.

But Brandon LeBlanc, Windows communications manager at Microsoft, has defended his company’s honour and suggested Google has its own security issues to contend with.

“There is some irony here that is hard to overlook,” he wrote on the Windows blog, before giving the example of Yale University abandoning its move to Gmail “citing both security and privacy concerns.”

Responding to an opinion expressed by the Financial Times – which first broke the story – that Windows is one of the more vulnerable operating systems, LeBlanc said: “When it comes to security, even hackers admit we’re doing a better job making our products more secure than anyone else.”

He added: “And it’s not just the hackers; third party influentials and industry leaders like Cisco tell us regularly that our focus and investment continues to surpass others.”

LeBlanc continued to list efforts his company is making on the security front, including automatic updates, Windows 7 BitLocker encryption and improvements to the built in firewall, and pointed critics towards the Microsoft Security Development Lifecycle blog.

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