That is what Niels Ferguson a developer & cryptographer for Windows Vista wrote in response to a BBC News article speculating about a possible “back door” in BitLocker (https://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/4713018.stm).
A backdoor in an OS will allow someone with the know-how and right tools to access the PC without the need for a username and password of that machine. Most IT Professionals know about this. In the company that I work for, the System Administration or SysAd was able to access all of our Windows XP Professional PCs without us informing or asking about our passwords (the company recently decided to switch to an NT domain login system).
This is useful for the government when seizing PCs (and to look for evidence). But with that response, the government will either have to live with it that “back doors are simply not acceptable” or they will have to force the Microsoft and the Windows Vista team to do it. The Vista team has two options as well, they will announce about the backdoor or they will completely pull the feature out from Vista.
I am with the Vista team, “Back doors are simply not acceptable”.
Check out Niels Ferguson’s blog post.