Microsoft has been forced to hastily issue a fix after a developer hid the words "big boobs" in a piece of its computer code.
The childish message was written as the hexadecimal string 0xB16B00B5, and was found in a program which helps Microsoft products work with Linux operating systems.
A developer, Paolo Bonzini, found the "hidden gem" and posted it to a Linux developers forum last Friday.
Later, another message was found: Boobies. (Or 0x0B00B135).
"Someone was trying to be funny, I guess" Bonzini said.
Microsoft has now issued a patch and apologised.
"We thank the community for reporting this issue and apologize for the offensive string," Microsoft told Network World.
"We have submitted a patch to fix this issue and the change will be published in a future release of the kernel."
However some analysts were not amused. Network World derided the "chucklehead" responsible and said that "apologists and enablers" were simply defending :the non-existent right to be just a little bit sexist, even at work, as long as it's just a little bit and as long as not too many people notice".