There are some worrying aspects to the anti-piracy technologies that are part of Microsoft’s new Vista operating system.

In any case, the entire concept of significantly reducing the functionality of running systems is saturated with risks. Microsoft notes that their products aren’t supposed to be used for “critical” types of applications. That’s a fine sentiment, but Microsoft has succeeded all too well in getting developers to use their operating systems in all manner of exceptionally important applications. That’s the reality.

Of course, just because Microsoft says that they can use such drastic anti-piracy measures in any particular situation, doesn’t mean that they necessarily will, but can we really afford to take that chance? Even if you are the most 100% squeaky-clean human on planet Earth, and would never even dream of running pirated software, you may want to think twice (or more than twice) before jumping into bed with Microsoft on this one.

The End User License Agreement (EULA) for Vista is also much more restrictive than previous EULAs. So your chances of inadvertently violating it, and hence being a software pirate, are much higher.

I can’t put it better than Bruce Schneier, commenting on a Los Angeles Times op-ed by Dennis Gilbert. People just aren’t rational about risk. They over react to some risks, and under react to others.
This has big implications for risk management, especially in risk identification and risk assessment.

More importantly, though, it affects how both we and those that govern us respond to global warming and terrorism.

Quantitative risk management is all very well, says this article, but it shouldn’t be used in isolation. Well, yes. The big risk is that the quantitative results don’t reflect reality: either the model is wrong, or it hasn’t been calibrated properly, or it’s using the wrong data. Even if you’ve got a good model, it can only give you results in terms of probabilities. Even a really unlikely event isn’t impossible. Once in a thousand years doesn’t mean that you’ve got to wait a thousand years for it to happen, or that it won’t happen twice in the same year.