Posted on 05/04/2006 10:36:48 AM PDT by ShadowAce
Some system administrators are finding that Microsoft's new anti-piracy software is incorrectly labeling PCs used in public places, such as university computer labs, as counterfeits, and that the solution sidestep a basic security practice for out-in-the-open machines, according to a newsgroup discussion of the issue.
After Microsoft unveiled its Windows Genuine Advantage Notifications tool last week, a university system administrator -- who preferred to remain anonymous but took the name "GodOfLions" on the Microsoft "WGA Validation Problems" newsgroup -- said that lab PCs came back as running fake copies.
"I work at a University where we have a bunch of Windows XP SP2 machines setup in lab areas," said GodOfLions in a message on the newsgroup. "In these areas students are allowed to log on to the systems, but their accounts are restricted to what they can do. The problem with the WGA installation is that it works perfectly fine as long as you are using an account with administrative rights on the system. As soon as one of the students, or other non-administrative level account, logs on to the system it screams that it is not a valid copy of windows and it is counterfeit."
A Microsoft staffer monitoring the newsgroup intervened, eventually diagnosed the problem, and offered a fix: give everyone, including the student systems running under rights-restrictive accounts, write access to a file called "data.dat."
"Validation tool writes data to data.dat file during validation process," wrote a Microsoft staffer identified as "Satish." So 'User account' needs to have Write access to file."
The system administrator eventually gave in to Microsoft's solution, but blasted it as violating the security concept behind limited-rights accounts.
"It does not make sense to have to reduce security in order to validate the system," wrote GodOfLions. "Yes it is only allowing write to one file, but still that is another small area you can have users or viruses now write to on a system that it didn't have before."
He also pointed out that the Microsoft tech support document outlining the rights needed by data.dat were still incorrect, and needed to be updated. As of Wednesday, the document had not been modified.
"Our lead architect has been informed and we are noting the changes necessary," was the response from Philip Liu, another Microsoft staffer. "I apologize sincerely upon the WGA team for causing this inconvenience for you," wrote Liu.
Various patches already exists to byepass the WGA check that validates your copy of Windows XP with Windows Update.
Checkout this article on how to manually disable the WGA Check too..
Or paranoid. Is Gates the next Howard Hughes?
This might work also
http://www.boingboing.net/2005/07/28/microsoft_genuine_ad.html
Okay, this is being inflicted on the Windows using world for one and only one reason: MS's proprietary business model refuses to come to terms with the fact that software is information, more akin to a mathematical theorem than to a machine.
When they start making money by providing service, rather than defending objectively indefensible proprietary 'rights', this kind of crap from MS will cease, until then, try to use as little MS code as feasible.
Well, Gates is trying to protect the revenue stream and I can respect that. They have made the investment and deserve the rewards. I just wish they did not demand such a high reward from us home users! hehehe
I am 100% MS free, and developing code, being productive, and playing games.
Feasibility is not the issue--it's whether the user wants to go through a slight learning curve.
ping
That's not a patch, that's a HACK. To circumvent copyright, of course. Funny how you always say "don't ask me, I don't do windows". Until it comes to how to hack it.
Zark off troll. Go bother someone who actually cares. Maybe you should try your left hand for a while.
Typical BS, when you should be apologizing for recommending that people run illegal versions of their software, and for pointing them to hacker sites that might trojan their systems. But nah, when somebody comes along to point these dangers out, you attack them as if they're the ones doing wrong, when it's obviously you we should be concerned about.
If course you'd claim so, because you contribute nothing positive to this forums, and instead use it to continue your trolling.
Remember folks, arguing petty semantics is the #1 sign you're dealing with a troll. It was true 15 years ago, an it is true today.
There you go with your BS again, referring to hacks for pirating software as "fixes". You must be from some blackhat group to even think like that, much lost post such tripe.
"much less"
i repeat. Troll tactic #1 is to attempt to make hay over petty semantics. Get a life moron.
Yeah, zeugma! How dare you suggest that you protect your own computer! Don't you realize that if Microsoft says you're guilty, the burden is on you to prove you're innocent, and you shouldn't be allowed to secure your computer until you do?
He never said that he said that if you dont want WGA to run. WGA can make running a legally purchased copy of windows less secure to run in a public lab (read the article before mouthing off).
Yeah, well, there is that. One reason I mentioned it originally is to point out the fact that no matter what MS does, there are always folks out there who can find a way around it. despite the best efforts of MS and others, it is still your computer and you still have full access to it. This makes it more difficult to implement a lot of this stuff because it is not just a black box that is not under the control of the owner.
Also, there are a lot of folks out there who bought computers, thinking they had purchased a legitimate OS along with it, who are now stuck with these annoying popups telling them that they are dirty rotten scoundrels for having pirated MS's software.
Personally, I think they'd be better off getting a real operating system than the junk toy one that came with their hardware. In addition to not having to worry about MS snooping on them, they also wouldn't have to worry about the thousands of viruses and worms that target Microsoft-based systems.
Indeed. Lord knows, we could use a little more security in the MS-Windows world.
That's not why you did it, Microsoft is not unique in this regard. You did it to glorify those that hack Microsoft software, because as far as you're concerned it's perfectly justified. In fact, you obviously encourage it.
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