The Microsoft sign outside the headquarters campus in Redmond, Wash.(Photo: Elaine Thompson AP)
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Microsoft wants to encrypt more of its Internet traffic as the world's largest software company responds to revelations about online spying by the National Security Agency, The Washington Post reported Wednesday, citing unidentified people familiar with the company's plans.
Top Microsoft executives are meeting this week to decide what encryption initiatives to deploy and how quickly. The company has become more suspicious of the NSA after reports in October revealed that the agency intercepted traffic inside the private networks of Google and Yahoo, the newspaper said.
The Washington Post released two new documents that describe operations against Google and Yahoo and also include references to Microsoft's Hotmail and Windows Live Messenger services.
A separate NSA e-mail obtained by the newspaper mentions Microsoft Passport, a Web-based service formerly offered by Microsoft, as a possible target of that same surveillance project, called MUSCULAR, which was first disclosed by The Washington Post last month.
Though Microsoft officials said they had no independent verification of the NSA targeting the company in this way, general counsel Brad Smith told The Washington Post that it would be "very disturbing" and a possible constitutional breach if true.
Kathy Roeder, a spokeswoman for Microsoft, did not respond to a request for comment Wednesday.
Google and Yahoo have already announced plans to use more encryption to secure data traveling between their data centers.
