Posted on 06/13/2006 11:45:10 AM PDT by Panerai
Millions of Windows users may unwittingly be test subjects for an unfinished Microsoft antipiracy tool.
The software maker has been delivering a prerelease version of Windows Genuine Advantage Notifications software to PCs as a "high priority" item in the built-in update feature in Windows. The tool, also known as WGA Notifications, is used to validate the authenticity of Windows software installed on a PC.
The move is a first for the software maker. Microsoft normally asks people to join test programs before it initiates the download of any such trial software.
"I don't think that we have done it before," David Lazar, director of the Windows Genuine program at Microsoft, told CNET News.com on Monday. "WGA Notifications is a unique program."
Microsoft has been expanding its effort to distinguish pirated copies of Windows from legitimately acquired ones. The original WGA program, launched in September 2004, calls for people to validate their Windows installation when they download additional Microsoft software from a Microsoft Web site. In November, it introduced the separate WGA Notifications program. It now sends prerelease WGA Notifications software to people in a number of countries, including the United States.
But some security experts are troubled by Microsoft's decision to deliver prerelease software to millions of Windows users without clearly notifying them. People may not realize they are participating in a trial and have in essence become unsuspecting guinea pigs, they said.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.com.com ...
I'm going to do all I can to stop any and all name calling from here on. No personal attacks, or details needed. Hopefully others will do likewise. Thanks.
LOL
sure thing Iggle
I paid $199 for an XP pro upgrade in 2001. I have had at least 10 different computers since then and change components all the time. I got fed up with having to call MS for a new product key (usually a 60 minute undertaking) every time I swapped out a component. I currently use an "undocumented" copy of XP that has all the updates on the same disk. I like XP, but if Vista requires me to call up and get a new key every time I change some hardware, I quit!
I'm going to scrounge up a copy of XP-Pro at work and see how the install of this particular MS-Spyware does here in a VMWare session when it has regular internet access, but no access to any of the microsoft netblocks.
I could also fire up a copy of tcpdump to monitor what it tries to do.
I don't blame you, but I don't think it's going to work that way. With the next generation of hardware and software, it should be much easier to verify ownership of software, via higher levels of encoding and encryption. Like today's DirecTv is light years ahead of original satellite technology, the next gen of PC/Game technology is going to be huge. That's why it's taken so many years to develop, just as we're seeing with the Playstation 3.
I don't know, what are you?
LOL
:)
"What they should do is alter the copyright laws so that operating software has a copyright limited to say 15 years. That would put Windows 3.1 in the public domain, with Windows 95 only a few years out."
What they should do is lower ALL IP protection to FIVE years, and stop expanding them far beyond what our Founders' ever imagined. Eternal protection for Mickey Mouse and Disney? Shameful. Even Walt doesn't deserve to have his works protected forever--if Mark Twain does not, no one does.
Seems to me if you don't want it just turn-off AutoUpdate.
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