By gradually migrating to a complete open source desktop and web applications, Gendarmerie Nationale, the French national police force with 105,000 employees, has saved millions of euros. The move cuts Microsoft out of the equation, helping the French national police force slash its IT costs by 70 percent.

The French paramilitary police force said Wednesday it is ditching Microsoft for the free Linux operating system, becoming one of the biggest administrations in the world to make the break.

"Today the Gendarmerie Nationale (The French national police force) announced the migration of up to 70,000 computers to Ubuntu over the next 3 years..."

Canonical, the company behind Ubuntu, now reports the police force has upgraded its 85,000 PCs to Ubuntu Desktop Edition, removing its reliance on the Microsoft operating system completely.

According to Lieutenant-Colonel Xavier Guimard's calculations, the French police plans to save $50 million in switching from Windows to Ubuntu.

The French Gendarmerie Nationale police contributed to the code of the last version of Mozilla Thunderbird with security extensions named "TrustedBird".

If the French National Assembly gets its way, the open-source Linux operating system will take over the governments of Europe, seizing on a weak economy to displace Windows.

The French government has come up with a wizard wheeze which seems to be entirely designed to back the software giant Microsoft.

In a Franco-American alliance, the likes of which has not been seen since the French backed a campaign by anti-democratic terrorists against its lawful government, the French are going to tax every tablet which does not come out with Windows software on-board.

The French National Assembly has passed a draft law that would allow illegal downloaders to be thrown off the net.