>>5
Of course not, but just like in any OS, if you have SYSTEM or root priviledges, you can load drives or other kinds of loadable kernel modules. I don't see a problem with this. I actually see a problem with Microsoft trying to make signing drivers mandatory for NT 6 (Vista,Win7) and their anti-kernel hooking code called Patchguard. However, in reality those measures only affect AV companies and most users that care about those things just disable mandatory driver signature checking and/or hack patchguard themselves to get you the same level of control you had with NT5. Malware writers were also not very bothered by signed drivers and patchguard - their ways of bypassing it included hooking the bootloader and hiding themselves even before Windows is started (and/or hooking into the system as it loads and disable security measures that way) or in less evil ways by adding their own root CA's or in a rather interesting recent twist, having their botnets collect private keys and sometimes they even manage to get keys from legitimate companies (realtek lost some keys last time i remember) and then just sign their drivers with those stolen keys. So in the end, the only losers here are some AV companies and some customers.