Microsoft worked hard on improving security with each new version of Windows and Windows 7 is expected to be the best so far. As if it wasn’t enough that Windows 7 is a more secure system from ground and up than any previous version, there is a trump. A bit unexpected, but no entirely surprising, the so-called Windows XP mode of Windows 7 can be an additional protection against hackers, says DigiTimes. Since Windows XP is emulated inside Windows 7 it becomes a lot harder for hacker applications to access the main operating system without the user noticing.
A nifty and skilled hacker can of course still bypass these additional security measures but those who want to feel extra secure may want to work through the Windows XP mode of Microsoft’s latest operating system. Even this kind of kills the point of buying a new operating system.
A common hacker tool — rootkits — rely on hardware virtualization and a special privilege level called VMX root mode. With the OS now using hardware virtualization, attempts to gain the privileges necessary to launch the special hardware virtualization support needed by the rootkit tends to crash the OS or provide the user with warnings. For this reason Blue Pill, one common rootkit, doesn’t work well in Windows 7.
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