The window is closed but the NSA has the key to the backdoor

[Yuri]

Firstly mods, sorry if this is in the wrong forum or OT but I came across this and thought that everyone should know.

http://www.voxnyc.com/archives/00000059.htm

This is an extract from the article

A CARELESS mistake by Microsoft programmers has revealed that special access codes prepared by the US National Security Agency have been secretly built into Windows. The NSA access system is built into every version of the Windows operating system now in use, except early releases of Windows 95 (and its predecessors). The discovery comes close on the heels of the revelations earlier this year that another US software giant, Lotus, had built an NSA "help information"

Yuri.

[Tuttle]

And the other side of the story: http://www.microsoft.com/technet/tre...s/backdoor.asp.

What are the keys used for?
The keys are used to verify the digital signatures on CSPs.

Why is the backup key labeled "NSA key"?
This is simply an unfortunate name. The NSA performs the technical review for all US cryptographic export requests. The keys in question are the ones that allow us to ensure compliance with the NSA's technical review. Therefore, they came to be known within Microsoft as "the NSA keys", and this was used as a variable name for one of the keys. However, Microsoft holds these keys and does not share them with anyone, including the NSA.

[Rapmaster]

I seriously doubt that the NSA needs a backdoor to read your information anyway, should they ever have a desire to.

[Yuri]

As I said in my first post, I stumbled across it while looking around on the net.
I didn't really think it was true, but I thought that I would post it here to see what everyone else thought of it.
Yuri.