In this case it seems to have been fully-fledged lying, not just bullshit: Microsoft (told the researcher they) delayed releasing this patch so they could relea

In this case it seems to have been fully-fledged lying, not just bullshit: Microsoft (told the researcher they) delayed releasing this patch so they could release a number of SMB-related fixes at once. They might have good reasons for doing that, but it isn't true to say they "proactively update impacted devices as soon as possible".