I don know if you have heard abot this already but anyways it sure was bout time.
"Microsoft allies with the FBI and U.S. Secret Service, and in coordination with Interpol, puts US$5 million into a program designed to identify and prosecute launchers of malicious code."
read more
http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/features/2003/nov03/11-05AntiVirusQA.asp
Microsoft has also listed bounties for the authors of recent virii that targeted the security vulnerabilities that came from Microsofts bad code...
So much for terrorism being the worst threat to the security of this country...
Microsoft being the premiere software company (especially of OS software), it makes sense that they would aid the law enforcement agencies in this. They do have a legitimate interest in removing these criminals after all.
I don't know any of the details though.
What Microsoft is really saying here...
"We finally realized that you could drive a fleet of semis through the security holes in our products, so we're gonna throw money at the problem and hope that the police bail us out."
I think Microsoft would have a vested interest in protecting their monopoly. If people realized about the goatse sized holes in their security, they might switch to OS X or Linux and we can't have that. There'll still be viruses, and people will need new software and lots of new patches.