Why do Linux fanatics want to make Windows 8 less secure?
The FUD is flying fast and furious over Windows 8, and the OS isn’t even in beta yet.
The Free Software Foundation (FSF) is organizing a petition-signing campaign over Microsoft’s announced support for the secure boot feature in next-generation PCs that use Unified Extensible Firmware Interface (UEFI) as a replacement for the conventional PC BIOS. My ZDNet colleague Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols is urging his readers to sign the petition with a bit of deliberately inflammatory language, calling it “UEFI caging.”
The crux of their argument is that Microsoft is deliberately requiring a change in next-generation hardware that will make it impossible to wipe off a Windows installation and install Linux. They are wrong, and their effort to whip up public fury is misguided at best and cynical at worst.
