Microsoft Will Warn Users If They Are Targeted By Government Hackers

As if it wasn’t bad enough the regular hackers are trying to break into our systems and steal our information, there are also state-sponsored hackers who are out targeting systems as well, although in the case of the latter it is presumably done for the sake of national security and whatnot.

That being said the good news is that Microsoft has your back. The Redmond company has recently announced that they will now notify users if they suspect that they are targets of a government hack.

According to Microsoft, “We’re taking this additional step of specifically letting you know if we have evidence that the attacker may be “state-sponsored” because it is likely that the attack could be more sophisticated or more sustained than attacks from cybercriminals and others. These notifications do not mean that Microsoft’s own systems have in any way been compromised.”

However this isn’t 100% altruistic on Microsoft’s part. A report from Reuters suggests that Microsoft only had a change of heart and modified its policy after it was discovered that back in 2011, the Chinese government had apparently attempted to hack Hotmail to gain access to the accounts of Tibetan and Uighur minority leaders.

Either way whatever the reason is, we suppose this is good news for users who value their privacy. Microsoft’s blog also details ways that users can go about trying to protect their account from would-be hackers.

Tyler Lee
Categories: Computers
Tags: Hacking, Legal, Microsoft, Security