Friday, August 20, 1999
Microsoft vows to fix e-mail bug today
The Associated Press
WASHINGTON — Microsoft Corp. acknowledged Thursday a bug in its new Internet chat software that permits coworkers and others to see a person's e-mail password. It promised to fix it by today.
The glitch in the company's new “MSN Messenger” software means that others who have access to a person's computer could impersonate that person to read and even send e-mail using his “Hotmail” account without anyone's knowledge.
Microsoft said that even if customers delete their saved password and enter it manually, it still becomes visible if another person types a specific sequence of keystrokes on that computer.
Microsoft, whose software runs most of the world's personal computers, promised to fix the problem by the end of today. The company said it was made aware of the bug earlier this week.
Deanna Sanford, the product manager for MSN, said the bug's ill effects were mitigated because a person must have physical access to the victim's computer, meaning the problem will be worse in offices where coworkers share machines than for home users.
“In a shared office environment, if you trust the people you work with, this will probably never be an issue,” Ms. Sanford said.
The latest Microsoft bug occurs when customers use the software to check their e-mail using Microsoft's popular Web-based “Hotmail” service. If a person stops the resulting Internet page from loading and looks at the underlying software code — which requires merely three clicks with the mouse — the user's e-mail name and password are displayed.
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