Windows Vista Steps in the Lion's Den

Microsoft has announced that it will attend the "Black Hat" conference starting August 2nd in Las Vegas. The Redmond Company will not enter empty handed the hacker community of "Black Hat" but will bring into the spot lights Windows Vista.

The official purpose of its participation in the conference is to present intimate technical details on Vista security to the hacking community. "We submitted several presentations to the Black Hat event organizers and, based on the technical merit and interest to the audience, they were accepted," said Stephen Toulouse, Microsoft program manager.

Off the record, the move made by Microsoft is meant as a test of Vista's security capabilities in a hostile environment, any unveiled vulnerability allowing for sufficient time for it to be repaired. Moreover, Microsoft proves once again that its marketing and PR departments are right on the money. This because, regardless of the "Black Hat's" hackers analysis on Vista security, the Redmond Company gets an image upgrade through the publicity that will surround the event.

Microsoft's presence at the conference will comprise five presentations from its security engineers, and will even include a preview of the way Vista mitigates memory overwrite vulnerabilities. "We want to make sure we're gathering as much feedback as we can, so that Windows Vista succeeds as the most secure version of Windows ever released," Toulouse added.