&gt; If this had been snuck into a regular patch with no fanfare, would we even be talking about it?<p>Oh, yes - we would be talking about it, at some point in time. This was going to come out one way or the other (dissecting firmware updates is a veritable cottage industry). Juniper <i>had</i> to announce this in order to control the messaging and maintain trust, when it comes to security, trust is the foundation.