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The following is the text of an article to be published
shortly...
Is your
Windows installation legal?
Dozens of computers in the village
are not running genuine Windows software. In this case “not genuine” does
not mean counterfeit, it means that the key used to unlock the Windows has
been used on another computer before.
In the past when Windows was very
expensive it was common practice to use the key from a friend or colleague,
or from the office to set up your home Windows computer. Now that a copy of
Home Windows XP can be bought for about 50 quid (without installation) the
reason for using a friends key is not nearly so valid, but there are still
many people who are unknowingly running what Windows (who delight in
scarring and intimidating its potential customers) still calls “fake” or
“illegal”.
Building an operating system such as
Windows is not an exact science. Indeed when Windows XP was first released
it was quite literally “full of holes”, mistakes in the programming which
anyone who knew what they were doing could use to either take over another
machine, and cause it to crash, or more likely use it to “hijack” another
computer and look inside to find credit card numbers, passwords etc.
For this reason Microsoft issue
Windows updates on a regular basis, and if your Windows has been installed
properly the updates are applied when the computer is otherwise idle, most
people know nothing about it. Occasionally you may be asked to restart your
machine when you are in the middle of something, but normally the actual
work is done when you turn off your computer at night.
Now Microsoft are realists, and
until recently they calculated that there must be many millions of computers
running fake or clone keys, apparently 90% of Chinese Windows computer
installations are in some way compromised! If all these computers remained
unpatched the security of ALL internet users could be compromised. So until
now Microsoft decided to not ask for any confirmation that your computer had
a genuine Windows key before updating it with essential security related
upgrades.
For a couple of years Microsoft have
been phasing in a confirmation protocol for OTHER Windows XP updates, and
especially updates that private users might want, such as the latest
“Windows Media Player” which has now reached incarnation number 10. If you
want to download this all singing and dancing (literally) media player then
you have to go through what Microsoft calls “Genuine Advantage” checks
before being given the software. Those in the know could sidestep this
requirement in seconds, but for the average person in the street this did
warn them if their Windows installation was fake so they could do something
about it.
The clever part of this strategy was
while most users didn’t mind if their music wouldn’t play with a pretty
picture on the screen, they most certainly would object if they couldn’t
type a letter or send an email. Gradually home users and especially the
young who use their computers for entertainment more than work would in this
way become aware that they were missing out on what their friends had if
their installation wasn’t genuine.
Had Microsoft been more restrictive
they could have prevented ANY upgrades to Windows systems without a definite
verification each time. The main problem with doing this is, believe it or
not, in-house computer departments who are renowned for not only employing
“engineers” who rise to a level one above their knowledge and experience,
but who are also renowned for taking every sidestep that they can.
A large business may have paid
Microsoft for 1000 copies of Windows, which would give them a few CDs
together with a list of 1000 genuine numbers. The fact is that an
organisation with a large number of computers will have technical problems
with some of them. Mix these faults in with such a large number of machines
and it won’t take long for the actual machines to become muddled up. If each
machine had a different 25 digit number attached to it and were that number
required each time that a computer had to “check in” with Microsoft before
any even vital updates, the whole enterprise could literally overnight grind
to a technological halt! Therefore it is common practice for in-house
technical support departments to use a SINGLE number for all their 1000
computers.
Following on from this it didn’t
take their poorly paid employees – the ones that often knew a lot more about
computers than their bosses - to work out that using a single number for all
1000 machines meant that there were 999 numbers which Microsoft had
authorised but which were sitting completely unused in a drawer or residing
on the in-house database. Couple this with easy ways to sell things on sites
such as eBay and suddenly Microsoft had a huge problem. If they came down
hard on those who had used a single number for many installations they might
quite easily close down the systems of some of the larges computer users in
the world. It is rumoured that the first day that Microsoft tried to harden
up their update procedure the very first organisation to loose its updates
belonged to….the North Wales Police Force!
The requirement was quickly and
quietly removed. Microsoft had to think again, quickly!
For the reasons explained above
therefore until now Microsoft have been policing (!) their registration keys
with a very light touch….until now!
Microsoft now reckon that the latest
updates to their operating system means that it is very secure from invasion
and hacking (yes, I said Microsoft now reckon…) so were some updates to go
uninstalled it wouldn’t be the end of the world, not for Microsoft anyway. A
second and rather more compelling argument is that within a few months
Windows XP will be old, ancient, in fact to many as old as Windows 98. There
is a new Windows coming out this Autumn called “Windows Vista” which will
have a massive publicity at launch. So were large users to suddenly find
that some of their machines were to “go wrong”, i.e. have software failures,
it might be just the nudge that they needed to look at getting the “latest
and greatest” new operating system Windows Vista!
For this reason there is every
chance that when you next switch on your computer you may get a polite gold
coloured notice appear in the bottom right corner of your screen saying that
unless or until you “verify” your installation you will get no more updates,
even vital ones.
Following on from this it doesn’t
take much stretching of the imagination to see that the next warning might
say…”If you don’t verify your installation within 28..27..26.. days then
your operating system will prevent you altering any data on your computer”.
Just as happens now when you don’t activate Windows XP on first
installation. Note, we don’t think they will ever prevent you actually
accessing your data as this would apparently be illegal in some areas of the
world. Areas EXCEPT the United States where such restriction to data IS
legal. So if your computer system has been set up to the default settings by
an idiot then it will think that it is in the USA despite being here in
Sussex. In this case, and you can tell this if when you type an @ (at
symbol) you get another symbol) it’s time to be afraid, be VERY afraid!
We were going to stop here but then
received a very valid question…
“What happens if I perform a
“Genuine Advantage Verification” and then accept Microsoft’s recommendations
to try and make my installation legal?
Well it would be great to report
that Microsoft said.. ”Thank you for your honesty, we will reward you with a
new valid key for just a few dollars. After all your system is working ok,
and we don’t actually have to do anything except sell you a new 25 figure
key”.
Unfortunately Microsoft don’t only
THINK money, they ARE money, so instead they will expect you to pay them
well over the shop price for a valid key. THIS IS MADNESS! It has been
possible to buy in the UK a 100% legal copy of Windows Home for just over
£50 including VAT. Unfortunately you cannot (legally) use this key to make
your present Windows system legal unless you rub the whole hard drive clean
and start all over again! Yes, you have to loose everything on your computer
and start with a “clean installation” to make your machine legally
acceptable to Microsoft. There ARE ways around this, but these take time and
you will certainly have to pay an experienced engineer for several hours
work to install this system – with the continuing risk of losing data.
Indeed even Microsoft warn you that you may lose all your data if you use
their expensive update! Add to this the fact that when you reinstall Windows
you may well find that your Word and other Microsoft programmes won’t run on
the new more modern version of Windows. – This does happen quite often!
So what is the best thing to do? Buy
a new computer, with the latest operating system, erm, that’s Microsoft
Vista isn’t it? Now we are not suggesting that Microsoft are doing anything
illegal but they did set up the system in the first place. Do you understand
why Bill Gates is so rich, and why there are organisations out there whose
sole purpose in life is to sidestep Microsoft at every step? |
