The Microsoft Company has just won a patent last Thursday for a certain feature which is closely reminiscent of the security function that has always been a part of Unix for over twenty years. It has also been used in Mac and Linux platforms as of late. The alleged "Johnny-come-lately" corporation basically owns the functionality at this point in time, which doesn't sit well with a lot of its critics.

The system software feature described in Patent 7,617,530 shows a special user interface; it reacts to a forbidden operation based on the user's present account setup wherein its task-enabling functions are revoked. The interface also has an authenticator region that includes a data-entry field setup to get a password and an authenticator that provides said password.

To the die-hard Linux loyalists of Groklaw, the claims made by the patent portray nothing more than the sudo function that's been a crucial part of the Unix platform for about twenty years or so (that is, since 1980) and it even dates back beforehand to the grand ol' days of the mainframe computer. The feature, which had lately been included in Mac and Linux OSes, has been developed to avert and avoid unauthorized commands from being run by forcing users to enter a password before these operations are executed.

Groklaw contends that Microsoft has basically patented Unix's sudo function for themselves, or at least a sudo that sports a GUI and has been streamlined and simplified enough for ordinary, non-tech-savvy users to utilize. However, certain online media publications contend Groklaw's argument, stating that the above assessment is incorrect. They usually cite a 2004 patent that Microsoft already got for sudo-like features as a counterpoint. These news sites further argue that it was the PolicyKit functionality that Microsoft's latest patent covered, which is utilized to modify user permissions for a multitude of Linux platforms.

Microsoft's patent was approved just as the U.S. Supreme Court struggled with issues concerning business methods such as those incorporated into software, and whether they should meet the criteria of patent security. Critics howled vehemently over the situation, emphasizing that physical innovations should be the only things patented just as a major contingent of technology firms maintained that application-driven functionality such as Priceline's reverse auctions and Amazon's one-click checkout are "fair game".