Sophos: Buncha crybabies (those other security firms bitching about Microsoft)

In a press release, Sophos, a competitor to companies like Symantec and McAfee that have been crying over Microsoft's spilt milk, says:

Symantec and McAfee should have prepared better for Microsoft Windows Vista. IT security firm Sophos is recommending that system administrators ask their security vendors if they are capable of properly protecting them on the forthcoming 64-bit version of Vista, as arguments continue regarding access to Microsoft's operating system code (kernel). Sophos has reassured its customers that Sophos Anti-Virus will offer full protection against malware threats on Vista, and suggests that some security vendors may not have given sufficient thought to the new operating system when developing their products...

"Symantec and McAfee may be struggling with HIPS because they haven't coded their solutions with high-spec Vista in mind," said Richard Jacobs, CTO of Sophos. "We've taken a different approach, by focusing on catching bad behaviour before it has a chance to occur. Additionally, we are building our technology by making use of supported Microsoft interfaces rather than by trying to subvert them. That's why we're ready for 64-bit Vista, and others aren't."

While the rest of the security players are complaining about Microsoft's PatchGuard, Sophos is going the other direction:

Sophos believes that PatchGuard is a positive step by Microsoft to improve security in Windows Vista, and is not in itself anti-competitive, provided that Microsoft delivers on its commitment to provide the same level of kernel support and integration to third party security vendors as it does to its own security product team.

Even if it's FUD (anybody want to do some FUDbusting? Please comment below), it's a brilliant chess move by Sophos. Make everyone else look like crybabies.

Oh the skits we could build around this little soap opera (for video).