Google Shows Windows No Love, For Security Reasons

Article by George Norman (Cybersecurity Editor)

on 01 Jun 2010

Remember the hacking incident that occurred back in January, when Google announced that its corporate infrastructure was targeted by a “highly sophisticated” attack that originated from China? If you don’t, click here for a quick reminder. After the attack Google decided that enough is enough and that it no longer wants to censor search results on Google.cn. So it decided to redirect Google.cn visitors to Google.com.hk (read more here).

It has now come to light that after the attack Google took one other decision: to give up on the Microsoft-developed Windows operating system (as a little side note, an IE vulnerability was a vector used in the attack on Google). According to the Financial Times, Google decided that for security reasons, it would be better to stop using the Windows operating system.

Google employees have told the Financial Times that they’re “not doing any more Windows” and that “many people have been moved away from PCs.” So Google is giving Windows the cold shoulder. Towards what operating system is Google shifting focus to? According to the employees who talked to the Financial Times, Google is moving “mostly towards Mac OS.”

At an international level, Google employs a more than 10,000 people. It is not clear how many employees will make the move from Windows to Mac. People who just now join the ranks at Google are given the option to choose between a Mac and a Linux-powered PC.

This is definitely good news for Cupertino-based software developer Apple. Speaking of good news for apple, the company recently announced that it sold 2 million iPads. Keep two things in mind. First, the iPad was released on April 3, about two months back – the iPhone broke the 1 million mark only 74 days after its release. Secondly, Apple announced that it sold 1 million iPads at the end of April. What the company is saying now is that by the end of May, one month later, it sold an additional 1 million iPads.

Update June 2: Microsoft reacts, says security is paramount (see here).



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