Contrary to what happens with what is considered Open Source software, public access to the source code of Microsoft products is not possible. That is at least what the theory dictates and all the protection methods that the software giant uses in systems like Windows. However, sometimes hacks occur in the form of leaks, something that happened at the time and that seems to have been repeated.
And it is that as we have now known, for just a few hours the company is investigating a possible unauthorized access to certain internal source code repositories. This actually results in code data hacking and theft of certain Microsoft programs. Apparently all this is linked to the group called Lapsus$ that in the past carried out similar movements against companies such as NVIDIA or Samsung.
All this has been known after the Twitter social network showed lists of folders in which Microsoft source code repositories could be seen. These screenshots that we mentioned suggest that the hackers had managed to download the source codes of elements such as Cortana and various Bing services. This is what put the Redmond on notice and began to study the possible hack suffered.
In fact, this is not the first time it has happened, as we told you about a year and a half ago. At that time, a Torrent file of no more and no less than 43 gigabytes appeared on the internet, containing the source code of several company operating systems. For example, among these we could find the iconic Windows XP. It is precisely for all this that Microsoft now fears that something similar has been repeated. As has been known on other occasions through attacks by this same group, it generally tries to obtain a ransom for the data of the attacked companies.
Dangers for Windows after the Microsoft hack
To give us an idea, in this case it seems that Lapsus$ was made with the source code of Bing, Bing Maps and the voice assistant Cortana. Of course, At the moment it is not clear if the attackers downloaded the complete source code. Similarly, it is unknown if other Microsoft applications or services are included.
Some have even wondered if the source code belonging to the new Windows 11 system would be included here. Although it cannot be confirmed at the moment, it is quite unlikely that this will happen, that is, that the original code of the new operating system would not be included in this data hack. And we must bear in mind that these source codes can contain very valuable information. It can be analyzed to locate security flaws that attackers could exploit.
Also, there is the possibility that these include valuable elements such as signing certificates, access tokens or API keys. Initially, Microsoft has a development policy that prohibits the inclusion of these so-called secret elements in its source code. This is done precisely because of this type of leak that we are commenting on.
Nothing has been confirmed at this time. However, it is more than likely that the code download from Bing, Bing Maps and Cortana actually happened. At the moment no ransom has been requested and it is unknown if there are other products of the firm included here.
