
New Anti-Piracy Windows 7 Update "Phones Home" to Microsoft Every 90 Days - wglb
http://lauren.vortex.com/archive/000681.html
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CodeMage
_For example, a major PC game manufacturer has apparently announced that their
games will soon no longer run at all if you don't have an Internet connection
to allow them to authenticate at each run._

Which "major PC game manufacturer"? I don't doubt there is one -- BioWare
attempted that once -- but I really dislike weasel phrasing. If you know which
one, spell it out. If you don't know, research it first. Just don't write it
like that.

~~~
vetinari
It is Ubisoft.

See this <http://www.shacknews.com/onearticle.x/62098> (random article from
google) for example.

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barrkel
KB71033 doesn't sound like a valid KB number - it's way out of sequence with
current KBs, which are approaching KB900000 or so.

~~~
stingraycharles
Furthermore, all the references to KB71033 found by Google are about this
exact same phone-home news:

<http://www.google.com/search?q=KB71033>

~~~
prewett
And, as of right now (1:39pm 2/11 CST), a link to this stingraycharles'
comment is #1 on Google if you follow his link.

~~~
invisible
It's rather like an infinite loop, no?

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tomh-
This is absolutely ridiculous, I wonder how long it takes before Apple to take
over this behavior. Crackers will always be able to outsmart Microsoft. The
only victims of this technology are paying customers, like me. Maybe it's time
to cancel my Action Pack and Websitespark memberships and use software from a
company who trusts its own customers and doesn't treat its customers as
potential pirates.

~~~
roc
Why would you expect Apple to follow suit? They don't even _have_ activation
codes. They already treat their paying customers the way you're asking to be
treated.

~~~
tomh-
Apple has other products which could incorporate this behavior (not trusting
their customers) like itunes content, iWorks or potentially jail broken
iphones. I mean there are various ways for Apple to gain more control over
their users.

~~~
alextgordon
As far as I know, Apple doesn't even _make_ a product with online activation.
They use serial numbers or nothing at all. They just don't care about
controlling their users.

~~~
boredguy8
Someone isn't a longtime user of Logic Pro, which had one of the most obtuse
and disruptive mechanisms to security that I ever experienced. Heaven forbid
you lose your dongle...

~~~
drewcrawford
Apple didn't originally develop Logic Pro (or the dongle), they bought it from
Elogic. Within one release of buying it, Apple removed the dongle from the
copy protection system. To be fair, this was pretty hard, as Logic actually
offloaded some DSP processing onto it.

Today, the copy protection consists of:

1\. The installer phones home to see if your serial is blacklisted. If Apple
can't be reached, you can install it anyway (unlike activation).

2\. Serials are blacklisted with each point release

3\. Offline update install packages are behind a serial-wall on Apple's
website, but are accessible with the system Software Update utility, which
does not check serials.

4\. Logic Pro broadcasts its serial over Bonjour, and won't start if another
system on the local LAN is using the same serial

This is by far and away the most lax copy protection system of any of the
professional DAWs. The primary copy protection is that it's mac-only, and the
people who blow $2k on a mac aren't likely to balk at a few grand on good
software.

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jrockway
_Suddenly, a pair of big, burly guys barge into your house and demand that you
let them check your computer to make sure that it's "genuine" and not running
pirated software._

This wouldn't bother me at all. I would then say, "Come back with a warrant,"
and expect to never see them again. If they secure the warrant and come back,
then they are legally-entitled to inspect the machine, which is fine.

Too bad they don't know the password for my full-disk encryption, though. (My
Win7 install is a VirtualBox image that runs inside my Linux install.)

But anyway, I love strict enforcement of software piracy rules. If people
become unable to pirate commercial software, they will use and improve Free
Software -- ending the problem of proprietary software forever.

~~~
bartl
You may joke, but this happened to some people I know, a few years ago, by the
BSA, here in Belgium.

Not only do they check if you have anything installed _now_ , but if there was
anything, from the software companies they represent, _ever_ installed, for
which you cannot prove now, on paper, that you paid for it.

They then offer you the choice to settle now, for a respectable sum of money,
or be officially charged, and you can await your trial.

~~~
jrockway
I would await my trial, where all the illegally-collected evidence becomes
inadmissible, and the charges are dropped with prejudice.

But of course, it would never get that far, because they wouldn't be allowed
in my house, and they wouldn't be given the decryption key. (Any EULA they
wave in front of you is invalid in the face of piracy; when you install
pirated software, you are only violating copyright law, not the EULA. Let the
police deal with it.)

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CoryMathews
I do not see any problem at all with this.

Its a completely valid thing for Microsoft to do. If you do not buy the
software then you cannot use it. It's not a free OS. If you want a free OS go
download some flavor of linux. Otherwise if you want windows you buy it. Why
wouldn't they try to keep out people who have pirated their software?

They could have made it auto forward all of ones information to the police,
since technically they stole the software. I think annoying you with some pop-
ups is a much more friendly way.

The downvotes tell me we have some pirated versions out there ;)

~~~
wendroid
The concern is about a) false positives, b) what happens on non-internet
connected machines inside secure facilities e.g. nuclear power stations,
banks, police stations, hospitals &c. &c.

So the only victims will ever be valid paying customers.

~~~
chrischen
As far as b) is concerned, it says if it can't connect to the validation
server nothing happens. No penalty.

As far as a) is concerned, call customer support. It says you might be able to
get it for free if you are a victim of fraud, and if not you should be able to
clear it up. You can easily bypass the activation limit by calling support, so
something like a false positive should be easily correctable.

I really don't see any valid excuse against this unless you pirate. And if you
don't like the system for any legitimate reason, don't buy Windows.

~~~
barrkel
And what if the company goes away? Or is acquired by another company that
doesn't want to support it?

Don't forget, this isn't just Windows. Other companies will point at MS and
use it to justify their own actions.

~~~
chrischen
If the company goes away then the servers that invalidate your Windows will
not do so anymore.

This system would be a problem, but only if having a working OS depended on
Microsoft keeping its servers up.

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zokier
I found this interesting piece "... the update runs quietly in the background
protecting your system."

Hopefully it really doesn't mean some kind of active protection eating
precious resources.

~~~
lurkinggrue
Ah, "Protecting" as it would be a shame if anything were to break around here.

