Senator Urges FTC Probe of Microsoft Over Security Failures

US Senator Ron Wyden, D-Ore., on Wednesday sent a letter to the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), urging it to investigate Microsoft’s cybersecurity practices and hold it accountable for gross negligence.

Microsoft’s security lapses, the senator says, have led to ransomware attacks on critical infrastructure organizations, including healthcare entities, putting patient care at risk, and threatening national security.

In his letter (PDF) to FTC Chairman Andrew Ferguson, senator Wyden argues that Windows, the widely used operating system that Microsoft has monopoly over, is “incredibly vulnerable to ransomware infections” in its default configuration.

According to the letter, Microsoft has made “dangerous software engineering decisions” that were largely hidden from corporate and government customers. These lapses could lead to an organization-wide ransomware infection if a single individual clicks on a malicious link.

This is exactly what happened in May 2024, when healthcare giant Ascension was hacked, the senator’s staff learned ...