This one, from a technical standpoint, isn't dangerous in and of itself. What makes it dangerous is that it can spread very, very rapidly and fill up mail servers, causing mail servers around the world to crash.

From a pure technical standpoint, it does look like Microsoft may win this one,

From a technical standpoint, we're at a place where we could see a short-term advance, as long as the numbers going forward aren't ridiculously awful.

[Sites often get hacked simply because they present an opportunity for vandalism and not because they espouse any ideology or cause that an attacker may oppose, said Ira Winkler, president of the Internet Security Advisors Group in Severna Park, Md., and author of a book called Corporate Espionage.] To a hacker, you're just an IP address, ... You get hit because you let yourself be an easy mark.

Traditional systems are meant more to protect their dollar invested in making sure they deny unauthorized users access because that saves them money,

These are not your average hackers. They're highly skilled people who try to find holes in commercial software.