Security Tip: Spam, Bitcoin and Wallets
In writing this blog, I encounter a lot of different spam comments every single day. None of this spam reaches the comment area of any blog article because of moderation and spam filtering. However, every once in a while I see a spam message that catches my eye and I feel the need to write about such traps. Let’s explore.
Today’s Spam
Today, I found this spam message and it spurred me to write this blog article:
Invest $ 5,000 in Bitcoin mining once and get $ 7,000 passive income per month
This sounds like a great deal, doesn’t it? Of course, this spam message arrived complete with a link to a website. I’ve redacted that part of this spam. The text is the most important part (or rather, the sleaziest part) and what I intend to discuss in this article.
Let’s dispel this one right away. You cannot invest $5,000 into a Bitcoin mining rig and get $7,000 a month in passive income. This is not possible. First off, Bitcoin is entirely volatile so values vary every minute. Second, you have to place your mined Bitcoin into a wallet somewhere. Third, a compute rig requires electric power, air conditioning and internet services requiring you to pay bills every month. Fourth, the maximum you could mine per month is a fraction of a Bitcoin.
Most mining rigs are lucky to make any money at all considering the electric bill cost alone. You must also pay your Internet service as Bitcoin mining requires regular check-ins with its sites to transfer the data processed during mining and download new data. Both the electric and internet bills are not at all inexpensive to own and will substantially reduce the value of any Bitcoin you might mine. There are also exchange fees to convert your Bitcoin into US Dollars (or vice versa), which will eat into the profits of your mined Bitcoin.
Mining
Bitcoin mining seems like a great thing. In reality, it is far from it. As I mentioned above, you need to not only invest in a specialty computer rig designed for Bitcoin mining, you also need to supply it with electrical power, heat dissipation (A/C or a fan) and internet service. In exchange for “mining”, you will occasionally receive tiny fractions of Bitcoin (when the bits align just right). When Bitcoin first began, the amount and frequency of Bitcoin given during mining was much higher than it is today. Worse, mining of Bitcoin will see less and less Bitcoin issued as time progresses. Why?
Bitcoin is a finite currency with a limit on the maximum number of coins ever. Once the coins are gone, the only way to get a coin is by getting it from someone who already has one. Even then, there’s a problem with that. That problem is called ‘end of life’ and, yes, even Bitcoin has an expiration date.
But… what exactly is “mining” and why is it a problem for Bitcoin? Mining is not what you think it is. This word imparts an image of men in hardhats with pickaxes. In reality, mining isn’t mining at all. It is a collective of computers designed to compute the general ledger of transactions for Bitcoin. Basically, each “mining” computer takes a small amount of potential ledger data given to it by an “authority” and then solves for the equations given. This information is handed back to the “authority”. The “authority” then compares that against all other results from other computers given the same data. If a consensus is reached, then the transaction is considered “valid” and it goes into the ledger as legitimate. This is the way the currency ferrets out legitimate transactions from someone trying to inject fake transactions.
There’s a lot more to it, but this is gist of how “mining” works. In effect, when you set up a mining computer (or rig), your computer is actually performing transaction validation for Bitcoin’s general ledger. In return for this calculation work, your computer is “paid” a very tiny fraction of Bitcoin… but not nearly enough to cover the real world money needed for the 24/7 constant computing. A Bitcoin payment is only issued during mining IF the calculation solves to a very specific (and rare) answer. And so begins Bitcoin’s dilemma…
Basically, if you take all of the fractions of Bitcoin you receive over a year’s worth of 24/7 general ledger computing, you might be lucky to break even once you take your electric and internet bills into account. However, you are more likely to lose money due to the rare incidence of solving the equation for payment.
Additionally, to store those fractions of Bitcoin from your mining activities, you’re going to need a wallet. If your wallet is stolen, well that’s a whole separate problem.
Bitcoin Logistics
Unless you’ve been living under a rock, many crypto wallets and companies that store wallets are entirely insecure. They “think” they are secure, but they’re not. They’re simply living on borrowed time. Too many wallet companies (and wallet technologies) have been hacked and have lost Bitcoin for many people. Because of the almost trivial vulnerability nature of a crypto wallet, owning Bitcoin is almost not even worth the risk. We’re not talking small amounts of Bitcoin lost. We’re talking tens of thousands of dollars “worth” of Bitcoin gone *poof* because the companies / wallets were hacked and Bitcoin emptied.
While there might be some reputable and secure wallet storage companies, you have no idea how secure they really are. Because it’s cryptocurrency, once the Bitcoin has left the wallet, there’s no way to get it back. It’s the same as if someone stole your wallet out of your pocket or purse. Once it’s gone, it’s gone.
Further, because Bitcoin’s wallet technologies are so hackable and because it holds real world value into convertible fiat currencies, like the US Dollar (and other currencies), there’s a real and solid motivation for hackers to find ways to get into and pilfer Bitcoin wallets from unsuspecting owners.
The Downsides of Bitcoin
As a miner, you’re paid in Bitcoin. Bitcoin has limited uses in the real world. There are some places that accept Bitcoin, but they’re few and far apart. Most places still only accept the local currency, such as the US Dollar in the United States. For Bitcoin to become a functional currency, it would need to be heavily adopted by stores and businesses. Instead, today most places require you to convert Bitcoin into the local currency. This is called exchanging currency and usually incurs fees for the exchange. You can’t put Bitcoin into a traditional bank. You can’t use it to pay most bills. Any business wanting to remain in business would need to convert any Bitcoin received into USD or similar. The conversion fee could be 1%, 2% or up to 10% of the transaction. There might even be a separate fixed transaction fee. These fees begin to add up.
All of this reduces the value of Bitcoin. If one Bitcoin is worth $1000 (simply used as illustration), you could lose up to $100 of converting that single Bitcoin to $1000… making it worth $900. Because Bitcoin is entirely volatile, a Bitcoin worth $1000 today could be worth $100 tomorrow. For this volatility reason and because of electric and internet bills, the idea of making $7000 in passive income in a month is not even a reality. If you could receive one Bitcoin per month via mining (hint: you can’t), you might clear $7000 (assuming one Bitcoin is worth $7000 when you go to convert). Chances are, you’re likely to get far, far less than one Bitcoin per month. More likely, you’ll get maybe 1/10th (or less) of a Bitcoin in a month’s worth of computing … barely enough to cover the cost of your electric bill… assuming you immediately cash out of your Bitcoin and use that money to pay your bills.
Insurance and Fraud
The US government insures bank and savings accounts from loss via the FDIC (Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation). No such governmental insurance programs cover Bitcoin (or any other cryptocurrency). Until or unless the US government issues its own digital currency and extends similar protections of the FDIC to banks storing those digital currencies, today’s decentralized cryptocurrencies are simply the “Wild West” of currency.
What “Wild West” means is that anyone who owns cryptocurrency is at risk of loss no matter what means is used to store your Bitcoin. Your coins are as secure as the weakest link… and the weakest link (among many) appears to be the wallet.
Cryptography and Security
Many crypto “banks” (though I hesitate to even call them a bank) claim high levels of security over your Bitcoin wallet. Unfortunately, your wallet is always at risk no matter where you store it. If it’s on a self-contained card on your person, that can be hacked. If it’s at a currency exchange service, like Coinbase, it can still be hacked (in a number of ways).
The problem with crypto “anything” is that (and this is the key bit of information that everyone needs to take away from cryptography) is that cryptography was designed and intended to offer transient “short term” security.
What I mean by “short term” is that it was designed to secure data for only as long as a transaction requires (usually a few seconds). An example is using an app on your phone to perform a transaction with your bank. Your logged-in session might last 5-10 minutes at most. Even then, a single communication might last only a few seconds. Cryptography is designed to protect your short burst transmissions. It would take a hacker well longer than that short transmission period to hack the security of your connection. By the time a hacker had gained access, your transaction is long over and you’re gone. There’s no way they could change or alter what you’re asking your bank to do (unless, of course, your device is compromised… a completely separate problem).
Bitcoin, on the other hand, is required to be secured in a wallet for months, years or potentially even decades. Cryptography is not designed for that duration of storage and protection. In fact, cryptographic algorithms become weaker every single day. As computers and phones and devices get faster and can compute more data, these algorithms lose their protections slowly. It’s like when rains erode soil on a mountain. Inevitably, with enough soil eroded, you’ll have a landslide.
With crypto, eventually the computers will become fast enough so as to be able to decrypt Bitcoin’s security in a matter of weeks, then days, then hours, then minutes and finally in real-time. Once computers are fast enough to hack through a wallet’s security in real-time, nothing can protect Bitcoin.
This is the vulnerability of Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies. Once computers hit the threshold to instantly decrypt Bitcoin’s security (or, more likely, Bitcoin’s wallet security), then Bitcoin is all over. You can’t store something when computers can gain unauthorized access in a few minutes. This law of diminishing cryptography returns is the security fallacy of Bitcoin.
Of course, Bitcoin developers will say, “Well, we’ll upgrade the Bitcoin cryptography to last longer than the then-current processing power”. It is possible for developers to say and potentially do this. But, that could still leave YOUR wallet vulnerable. If your wallet happens to be stored in an older cryptographic format that is vulnerable, then what? You may not even know your wallet is being stored in this vulnerable way if it’s stored at an exchange like Coinbase. That could leave yours and many other’s wallets hanging out to dry. Unless the currency exchange shows you exactly the format your wallet is being stored in and exactly the strength of cryptography being used, your wallet could very well be vulnerable.
Note that even the strongest encryption available today could still contain vulnerabilities that allow it to be decrypted unintentionally.
Bitcoin Uses
Probably the only single use of Bitcoin is as part of a balanced portfolio of assets. Diversifying your portfolio among different investment strategies is the only real way to ensure your portfolio will continue to grow at a reasonable rate. This is probably one of the only reasons to legitimately invest in Bitcoin. However, you don’t need to outlay for a mining rig to do it. Some investment firms today now allow for investment into cryptocurrencies as part of its investment portfolio offerings.
Still, you’ll have to be careful with investing in cryptocurrencies because there can be hidden transaction fees and conversion fees involved. These are called “loads” in the investing world. This means that you might invest $50, but only receive $40 in Bitcoin. That $10 lost represents the “load”. If you sell out of Bitcoin, you may also receive yet another “load” and again lose some of your money in the exchange. You have to take into account these “loads” when you choose to invest in certain funds. “Load” funds are not limited to Bitcoin. These exist when investing in all sorts of funds including mutual funds and ETFs.
However, Bitcoin (and other cryptocurrencies) can be valuable as part of a balanced portfolio. Of course, Bitcoin would be considered a Risky type of investment because of its volatility. Depending on how your portfolio is balanced, you may not want to invest in something as risky as Bitcoin. Not all portfolio management companies (i.e., Schwab, E*Trade, Ameritrade, etc) may offer cryptocurrency as an investment strategy. You’ll need to check with your specific company to determine if Bitcoin is available.
End of Bitcoin
Because Bitcoin is finite in total numbers of coins, eventually computing the general ledger will no longer pay dividends. What I mean is, once the Bitcoins run out, there will be no way to pay the miners. Bitcoin currently pays miners from the remaining ever diminishing pool of Bitcoin. Once there’s no more Bitcoins in the pool, there’s no more payments to the miners. This means that Bitcoin is dead. No one is going to continue to spend their expensive electric and internet bills on computing a general ledger that offers no dividends. No general ledger computations, no transactions.
This means that eventually, miners will stop mining. Once a critical mass of general ledger computation stops, computing Bitcoin transactions may become impossible. This will be the death of Bitcoin (and any other cryptocurrencies that adopt the same mining payment model). You can’t spend a Bitcoin as liquid currency if there’s no way to validate a transaction.
Some people think that it might require Bitcoin to completely hit zero, but it doesn’t. Once the remaining pool gets small enough, the algorithm gives out ever smaller amounts of payment in return for computing. At some point, spending thousands of dollars on a rig to gain a few pennies worth of Bitcoin every month won’t be worth it. Miners will shut off their mining activities. As more and more miners realize the futility of their mining efforts, fewer and fewer will mine.
When a compute (or lack thereof) critical mass is reached, Bitcoin will be in a crisis. This is the point at which the value of Bitcoin will plummet, taking with it many “paper Bitcoin millionaires”.
If you own Bitcoin, you need to watch and listen carefully to this part of the Bitcoin world. In fact, we are likely already on the downward slope of the bell curve for Bitcoin computing. How far down the bell curve is unknown. Unfortunately, as with most investment products, many people hold on far too long and get wiped out. It’s best to sell out while you know the currency holds value. Don’t wait and hold thinking it will infinitely go up. It won’t.
Eventually, Bitcoin will die because of its finite number of coins and its heavy reliance on “mining”… which “mining” relies on offering dividends. When the dividends stop being of value, so will end the mining and, by extension, so Bitcoin will end.
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Rant Time: Bloomberg and Hacked Servers
Bloomberg has just released a story claiming SuperMicro motherboards destined for large corporations may have been hacked with a tiny “spy” chip. Let’s explore.
Bloomberg’s Claims
Supposedly the reporters for Bloomberg have been working on this story for months. Here’s a situation where Bloomberg’s reporters have just enough information in hand to be dangerous. Let’s understand how this tiny chip might or might not be able to do what Bloomberg’s alarmist view claims. Thanks Bloomberg for killing the stock market today with your alarmist reporting.
Data Compromise
If all of these alleged servers have been compromised by a Chinese hardware hack, someone would have noticed data streaming out of their server to Chinese IP addresses, or at least some consistent address. Security scans of network equipment require looking through inbound and outbound data logs for data patterns. If these motherboards had been compromised, the only way for the Chinese to have gotten that data back is through the network. This means data passing through network cards, switches and routers before ever hitting the Internet.
Even if such a tiny chip were embedded in the system, many internal only servers have no direct Internet access. This means that if these servers are used solely for internal purposes, they couldn’t have transmitted their data back to China. The firewalls would prevent that.
For servers that may have had direct access to the Internet, these servers could have sent payloads, but eventually these patterns would have been detected by systems administrators, network administrators and security administrators in performing standard security checks. It might take a while to find the hacks, but they would be found just strictly because of odd outbound data being sent to locations that don’t make sense.
Bloomberg’s Fantasy
While it is definitely not out of the realm of possibility that China could tamper with and deliver compromised PCB goods to the US, it’s doubtful that this took place in the numbers that Bloomberg has reported.
Worse, Bloomberg makes the claim that this so-called hacked hardware was earmarked for specific large companies. I don’t even see how that’s possible. How would a Chinese factory know the end destination of any specific SuperMicro motherboard? As far as I know, most cloud providers like AWS and Google buy fully assembled equipment, not loose motherboards. How could SuperMicro board builders possibly know it’s going to end up in a server at AWS or Google or Apple? If SuperMicro’s motherboard products have been hacked, they would be hacked randomly and everywhere, not just at AWS or Google or whatever fantasy Bloomberg dreams up.
The Dangers of Outsourcing
As China’s technical design skills grow, so will the plausibility of receiving hacked goods from that region. Everyone takes a risk ordering any electronics from China. China has no scruples about any other country than China. China protects China, but couldn’t give a crap about any other country outside of China. This is a dangerous situation for China. Building electronics for the world requires a level of trust that must exist or China won’t get the business.
Assuming this alleged “spy chip” is genuinely found on SuperMicro motherboards, then that throws a huge damper on buying motherboards and other PCBs made in China. China’s trust level is gone. If Chinese companies are truly willing to compromise equipment at that level, they’re willing to compromise any hardware built in China including cell phones, laptops and tablets.
This means that any company considering manufacturing their main logic boards in China might want to think twice. The consequences here are as serious as it can get for China. China has seen a huge resurgence of inbound money flow into China. If Bloomberg’s notion is true, this situation severely undermines China’s ability to continue at this prosperity level.
What this means ultimately is that these tiny chips could easily be attached to the main board of an iPhone or Android phone or any mobile device. These mobile devices can easily phone home with data from mobile devices. While the SuperMicro motherboard problem might or might not be real, adding such a circuit to a phone is much more undetectable and likely to provide a wealth more data than placing it onto servers behind corporate firewalls.
Rebuttal to Bloomberg
Statements like from this next reporter is why no one should take these media outlets seriously. Let’s listen. Bloomberg’s Jordan Robertson states, “Hardware hacking is the most effective type of hacking an organization can engineer… There are no security systems that can detect that kind of manipulation.” Wrong. There are several security systems that look for unusual data patterns including most intrusion detection systems. Let’s step back for a moment.
If the point in the hardware hacking is to corrupt data, then yes, it would be hard to detect that. You’d just assume the hardware is defective and replace it. However, if the point to the hardware hack is to phone data home, then that is easily detected via various security systems and is easily blocked by firewalls.
The assumption that Jordon is making is that we’re still in the 90s with minimal security. We are no longer in the 90s. Most large organizations today have very tight security around servers. Depending on the role of the server, it might or might not have direct trusted access to secured data. That server might have to ask an internal trusted server to get the data it needs.
For detection purposes, if the server is to be used as a web server, then the majority of the data should have a 1:1 relationship. Basically, one request inbound, some amount of data sent outbound from that request. Data originating from the server without an inbound request would be suspect and could be detected. For legitimate requests, you can see these 1:1 relationships in the logs and when watching the server traffic on a intrusion detection system. For one-sided transactions sending data outbound from the server, the IDS would easily see it and could block it. If you don’t think that most large organizations don’t have an IDS even simply in watch mode, you are mistaken.
If packets of data originate from the server without any prompting, that would eventually be noticed by a dedicated security team performing regular log monitoring and regular server security scans. The security team might not be able to pinpoint the reason (i.e. a hardware hack) for unprompted outbound data, but they will be able to see it.
I have no idea how smart such tiny chip could actually be. Such a tiny chip likely would not have enough memory to store any gathered payload data. Instead, it would have to store that payload either on the operating systems disks or in RAM. If the server was cut off from the Internet as most internal servers are, that disk or RAM would eventually fill its data stores up without transfer of that data to wherever it needed to go. Again, systems administrators would notice the spike in usage of /tmp or RAM due to the chip’s inability to send its payload.
If the hacking chip simply gives remote control access to the server without delivering data at all, then that would also be detected by an IDS system. Anyone attempting to access a port that is not open will be blocked. If the chip makes an outbound connection to a server in China and leaves it open would eventually be detected. Again, a dedicated security team would see the unusual data traffic from/to the server and investigate.
If the hacking chip wants to run code, it would need to compiled it first. That implies having a compiler in that tiny chip. Doubtful. If the system builder installs a compiler, the spy chip might be able to leverage it, assuming it has any level of knowledge about the current operating system installed. That means that chip would have to know about many different versions of Linux, BSD, MacOS X, Windows and so on, then have code ready to deploy for each of these systems. Unlikely.
Standards and Protocols
Bloomberg seems to think there’s some mystery box here that allows China to have access to these servers without bounds. The point to having multi-layer security is to prevent such access. Even if the motherboards were compromised, most of these servers would end up behind multiple firewalls in combination with continuous monitoring for security. Even more than this, many companies segregate servers by type. Servers performing services that need a high degree of security have very limited ability to do anything but their one task. Even getting into these servers can be challenge even for administrators.
For web servers in a DMZ which are open to the world, capturing data here might be easier. However, even if the hacker at SuperMicro did know which company placed an order for motherboards, they wouldn’t know how those servers would ultimately be deployed and used. This means that these chips could be placed into server roles behind enough security to render their ability to spy as worthless.
It’s clear, these reporters are journalists through and through. They really have no skill at being a systems administrator, network engineer or security administrator. Perhaps it’s now time to hire technical consultants at Bloomberg who can help you guide your articles when they involve technical matters? It’s clear, there was no guidance by any technical person who could steer Jordan away from some of the ludicrous statements he’s made.
Bloomberg, hire a technical consultant the next time you chase one of these “security” stories or give it up. At this point, I’m considering Bloomberg to be nothing more a troll looking for views.
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What’s wrong with Vista / Windows?
This post comes from a variety of issues that I’ve had with Vista (specifically Vista 64 Home Premium). And, chances are, these problems will not be resolved in Windows 7. Yet, here they are in all their glory.
Memory Leaks
Vista has huge and horrible memory leaks. After using Vista for a period of time (a week or two without a reboot) and using a variety of memory intensive 3D applications (Daz Studio, Carrara, The Gimp and Poser.. just to name a few), the system’s memory usage goes from 1.69GB to nearly 3GB in usage. To answer the burning question… yes, I have killed all apps completely and I am comparing empty system to empty system. Worse, there is no way to recover this memory short of rebooting. If you had ever wondered why you need to reboot Windows so often, this is the exact reason. For this reason alone, this is why Windows is not considered ‘stable’ by any stretch and why UNIX outperforms Windows for this reason alone.
Startup and Shutdown
Microsoft plays games with both of these procedures.
On Startup, Microsoft’s engineers have tricked you into thinking the system is functional even when it isn’t. Basically, once the desktop appears, you think you can begin working. In reality, even once the desktop appears, you still cannot work. The system is still in the process of starting up the Windowing interface on top of about 100 background services (on many of which the windowing interface relies). This trick makes Windows appear snappier to start up than it really is. In fact, I would prefer it to just ready the system fully, then present the Windowing interface when everything is 100% complete. I don’t want these tricks. When I see the windowing interface, I want to know I can begin using it immediately… not before.
On Shutdown, we have other issues. With Vista, Microsoft Engineers have done something to this process to make it, at times, ridiculously slow. I have seen 8-15 minute ‘Shutting Down’ screens where the hard drive grinds the entire time. I’m sorry, but shutdown time is not housekeeping time. That needs to be done when the system is running. It should not be done during shutdown procedures. A shutdown should take no more than about 1-2 minutes to complete flushing buffers to disk and killing all processes. If it can’t be done in 1-2 minutes, shut the system down anyway as there is nothing that can be done to finish those tasks anyway.
Windows Updates
Microsoft was supposed to eliminate the need to shutdown/reboot for most Windows updates. For some updates, this is true. For the majority of Windows updates, this is still not true. In fact, Microsoft has, once again, made this process multistep and tediously slow in the process. Don’t get me wrong, I’m grateful that they are now at least verbose in, sort of, what’s going on.. but that doesn’t negate the fact that it’s horribly slow. The steps now are as follows:
- Windows installation process (downloading and installation through the Windows dialog box). You think it’s over when you..
- Restart the system and it goes through finishing Step 2 of this process during shutdown… and then you think it’s over again when
- The system starts back up and goes through Step 3 of the update process.
Ok, I’m at a loss. With Windows XP, we had two steps. Those first during Windows updater and the second when the system starts back up. Now with Vista, we have to introduce another step?
Windows Explorer
For whatever reason, Windows Explorer in Vista is horribly broken. In Window XP, you used to be able to configure your Windows how you liked then lock it in with Tools->Folder Options and then View->Apply to Folders. This would lock in exactly how every window should appear (list or icon format, size of icons, etc). With Windows Vista, this is completely and utterly broken. Basically, this functionality simply no longer works. I’ve tried many many times to lock in a format and Windows just randomly changes the folders back to whatever it feels like doing.
For example, I like my windows to look like this:
Favorite Format
Unfortunately, Windows has its own agenda. If I open a file requester (the standard Vista requester… the one that looks like the above) and I change the view to ANY other style than the one above, this change randomly changes other folder views on the system permanently. So, I might open the above folder and it will later look like any of these:
Format Changed 1
Format Changed 2
or even
Format Changed 3
All of which is highly frustrating. So, I’ll visit this folder later and see the entire headers have changed, or it’s changed to icon format or some other random format. Worse, though, is that I’ve specifically changed to the folder to be my favorite format with Tools->Options. In fact, I’ve gone through this permanent change at least 3-4 times after random changes have happened and inevitably it changes to some other format later. Again, highly frustrating.
Access Denied / Enhanced Security
For whatever reason, Microsoft has made shortcuts to certain folders. Like for example, in your profile directory they have renamed ‘My Documents’ to simply ‘Documents’. Yet, for whatever reason, Microsoft has created shortcuts that don’t work. For example, if I click on ‘My Documents’ shortcut, I see ‘Access Denied’. I don’t get why they would create a shortcut and then prevent it from working.
The only thing the enhanced security has done for Windows users is make it more of a problem to work. Security goes both ways. It helps protect you from malicious intent, but it can also get in the way of usability. Security that ultimately gets in the way, like UAC, has failed to provide adequate security. In fact, it has gone too far. UAC is a complete and utter failure. Combining this with making nearly every security issue tied to the SYSTEM user (with practically zero privileges), makes for stupid and exasperating usability.
Filesystem
To date, Windows still relies heavily and ONLY on NTFS. Linux has about 5-6 different filesystems to choose from (Reiser, VxFS, XFS, Ext2, Ext3, JFS, BSD and several others). This allows systems administrators to build an operating system that functions for the application need. For example, some filesystems perform better for database use than others. On Windows, you’re stuck with NTFS. Not only is NTFS non-standard and proprietary (written by Veritas), it also doesn’t perform as well as it should under all conditions. For database use, this filesystem is only barely acceptable. It has hidden limits that Microsoft doesn’t publish that will ultimately bite you. Microsoft wants this to become a pre-eminent datacenter system, but that’s a laugh. You can’t trust NTFS enough for that. There are way too many hidden problems in NTFS. For example, if you hit a random limit, it can easily and swiftly corrupt NTFS’ MFT table (directory table). Once the MFT table is corrupt, there’s no easy way to repair it other than CHKDSK. Note that CHKDSK is the ONLY tool that can truly and completely fix NTFS issues. And, even CHKDSK doesn’t always work. Yes, there are third party tools from Veritas and other companies, but these aren’t necessarily any better than CHKDSK. Basically, if CHKDSK can’t fix your volume, you have to format and restore.
Note, however, that this isn’t a general Vista issue. This problem has persisted back to the introduction of NTFS in Windows NT. But, Microsoft has made no strides to allow or offer better more complete filesystems with better repair tools. For example, Reiser and EXT3 both offer more complete repair tools than NTFS ever has.
Registry
The registry has got to be one of the most extensive hacks ever placed into any operating system. This kludge of a database system is so completely botched from a design perspective, that there’s really nothing to say. Basically, this system needs to be tossed and redesigned. In fact, Microsoft has a real database system in MSSQL. There is no reason why the registry is not based on MSSQL rather than that stupid hack of a thing call a hive/SAM. Whomever decided on this design, well.. let’s just hope they no longer work at Microsoft.
Failure
For the above reasons (and others), Microsoft has completely failed with Windows Vista. This failure was already in the making, though, when Longhorn was announced ages ago. In fact, Microsoft had planned even more draconian measures to enable heavy DRM on Windows. Thankfully, that was removed from Vista. But, what remains makes Vista so encumbered and exasperating to use, it’s no wonder users are frustrated using Vista. Combining that with its incredibly large footprint (1.6GB of memory just to boot the OS), and you have a complete loser of an OS.
Windows 7 is a glimmer of hope, but it is still heavily tied to Vista. If UAC and these stupid SYSTEM user security measures remain, then nothing will really change. Microsoft needs to take Windows back to the drawing board and decide what is necessary and what isn’t. Preventing the user from actually using the operating system is not and should not be a core value, let alone part of security. Yet, here we are.
Microsoft, you need to take a look at the bigger picture. This is your final chance to get Windows right. There are plenty of other unencumbered operating systems out there that do not get in the way of desktop computing. These operating systems are definitely a threat to Microsoft’s continued viability… especially with blundering mistakes like Vista. Windows will never win any awards for Best Operating System with issues such as these. Consider Microsoft’s stupid filesystem layout that allows operating system and application files to be thrown all over the hard drive and you’ll begin to understand why Windows continues to fail.
The single reason why Microsoft continues to exist is because users feel compelled to buy this antiquated dog of an operating system strictly due to application support. If developers would finally and completely jump ship to other more thoughtfully designed operating systems, then Windows would finally wither and die… eventually, this will happen.
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