Geer: "It was a surprise."

R. A. Hettinga rah at shipwright.com
Sat Sep 27 15:55:37 EDT 2003


<http://business.bostonherald.com/businessNews/business.bg?articleid=363&format=text>

Boston Herald



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Critique of Microsoft eyed in firing: Ex-tech officer claims report cost
his job
By Jay Fitzgerald
Saturday, September 27, 2003

The ex-chief technology officer for AtStake Inc. in Cambridge said
yesterday he was forced out after co-authoring a critical report about
Microsoft Corp. - an AtStake client - and is weighing his legal options.

Dan Geer's study, made public Wednesday, warned Microsoft's dominance
of desktop computer operating systems poses a national security threat.
Microsoft opponents said what happened to Geer shows the giant software
company was once again throwing its weight around against critics.

Sean Sundwall, a Microsoft spokesman, said the Redmond, Wash., company
had nothing to do with Geer's departure. But he said AtStake ``contacted us
late Tuesday night expressing their disappointment in the report and saying
that Dan Geer's opinion did not reflect the position of (the company).''

Lona Therrien, the AtStake spokeswoman, said she didn't ``know
anything about'' AtStake contacting Microsoft on Tuesday.

 Geer said he was told Wednesday he no longer had a job at the
company. ``I was forced out,'' he said. ``It was a surprise.''

``I expected to have a long and never-ending career at the company,''
Geer said.

The exact reasons - and timing - of Geer's departure from AtStake was
the source of intense controversy yesterday. The report from Geer and six
other computer-security experts argued the complexity and dominance of
Microsoft's Windows operating system in federal agencies made the
government prone to cyber attack - a national security threat.

Though the authors said they weren't paid by anyone to produce the
report, it was distributed by the Computer and Communications Industry
Association, a harsh critic of Microsoft backed by rivals of the software
giant.

On Thursday, AtStake issued a brief statement saying Geer's views did
not reflect those of the company and that Geer had left its employ Tuesday
- a day before the report was released.

A spokeswoman for AtStake, a three-year-old computer security firm,
said she would not comment on ``personnel matters.''

Describing himself as a founding AtStake employee, Geer said he is in
contact with a lawyer and is ``disappointed'' with the way he lost his job.

Geer also blasted academic researchers whom he said fear Microsoft and
won't criticize it publicly.

He said academics often fear losing Microsoft research money.


-- 
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R. A. Hettinga <mailto: rah at ibuc.com>
The Internet Bearer Underwriting Corporation <http://www.ibuc.com/>
44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA
"... however it may deserve respect for its usefulness and antiquity,
[predicting the end of the world] has not been found agreeable to
experience." -- Edward Gibbon, 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire'

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