Microsoft Responds To Linux Concerns Over Windows 8 and UEFI Secure Boot

[wraggster]

A few days ago, Red Hat employee Matthew Garrett speculated that OEM machines shipping with copies of Windows 8 may lock out support for Linux installations (http://linux.slashdot.org/story/11/09/21/062231/how-microsoft-can-lock-linux-off-windows-8-pcs). Garrett highlighted Microsoft's new Secure Build OEM requirements for Windows 8 systems. Microsoft chose to directly respond to confusion surrounding Windows 8's use of the UEFI Secure Boot feature (http://blogs.msdn.com/b/b8/archive/2011/09/22/protecting-the-pre-os-environment-with-uefi.aspx) on Thursday. Tony Mangefeste of Microsoft's Ecosystem team said, 'Microsoft supports OEMs having the flexibility to decide who manages security certificates and how to allow customers to import and manage those certificates, and manage secured boot. We believe it is important to support this flexibility to the OEMs and to allow our customers to decide how they want to manage their systems.'

http://linux.slashdot.org/story/11/09/23/1236221/microsoft-responds-to-linux-concerns-over-windows-8-and-uefi-secure-boot