Oh, and did we mention that they used the US’s DMCA (Digital Millennium Copyright Act) to do this?

All these details and more are reveled in ReadWriteWeb’s juicy tale of Microsoft’s Spy Guide, and the subsquent takedown of the whistle-blower. The EFF (Electronic Frontier Foundation) has already weighed in.

Never mind the abuse of these measures by less-than-scrupulous governments, we’re kind of bothered that Microsoft allows a document with instructions like “How do I read Email account results?” (page 6) to flap around in the breeze where cyber-criminals can abuse the knowledge. but yeah, this looks like a scandal we’ll be hearing about for a while.

Your passwords are crucial to your wireless network security and should not be revealed to unauthorized individuals. Do not leave your password lying around or written in an obvious location. When entering your username and/or password, make sure people are not milling around and looking over your shoulder.

Be very careful of responding to emails asking for passwords. Most legitimate companies do not ask for passwords via email due to the lack of security. These tips are useful for both wireless security and wired security.