http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/437967.stm <--- More
>>Two years ago, cryptographers found an alternative, and apparently superfluous, second embedded key. The new details came to light through debugging information erroneously left in the latest service pack for Windows NT.
Significantly, the key has the data tag "_NSAKEY" giving rise to speculation that the NSA persuaded Microsoft to give it special access to Windows in a secret deal.
Microsoft says it called its function an "NSA key" because the body reviews technical details for the export of data-scrambling software.<<
>>Microsoft suffered serious embarrassment on Monday when hackers exposed a simple way of breaking into the mailboxes of more than 40 million users of its Hotmail e-mail service.<<