Pirated Vista -- A darkness descends!

To all the Pirates our there....arrrrr!

If any of you are running a pirated version of Vista, MS has activated a new "Reduced Functionality" feature that essentially leaves your unlicensed Vista inoperable. Sucks to be you!

A copy of this e-mail was obtained by Computerworld.

Quote:

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"Good afternoon, as of this week, Microsoft has activated a function in Vista called 'Reduced Functionality.' This is a specific function in Vista that effectively disables nongenuine copies of Windows. Therefore anyone who has a pirated copy of Vista will experience:

A black screen after one hour of browsing
No start menu or task bar
No desktop

Please communicate this antipiracy initiative from Microsoft to your resellers -- note this function has only just been activated in Vista worldwide and therefore any issues with nongenuine versions will start to arise from now onward."

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http://www.computerworld.com/action/...icleId=9035478

This is new? I was aware of this "feature" before Vista came out.

The 1 hour time lapse is to allow anyone with an invalid version of Vista to backup their files before blackout.

[Edit]
I can't find an article (after a quick search) but I did find this:
http://www.neowin.net/index.php?act=view&id=38289

Maybe I was just thinking about an unactivated Vista after 120 days?

If so, my bad.

Hmmm,

Posted on this forum almost a year ago:

http://antionline.com/showthread.php?t=273736

It does explain that incident a few days ago when genuine users went to the M$ site to download optional stuff and it told them their legitimate software was pirated, and caused "reduced functionality"

Discussed here:

http://antionline.com/showthread.php?t=275853

:xbones:

I guess that was Micro$haft's idea of "RC2 Beta Testing"?

Muhahahahahahahaha :lildevil:

Personally, I think Ballmer is preparing a doS attack on the whole world, so
he can take hostages and get his 72 virgins. Hasn't it occurred to anyone
else that this weapon can be used against anyone?

Imagine M'soft discretely informing the president that they will
bring the government to its knees unless certain demands are met.
You are dealing with sci-fi style megalomaniacs here.

The solution:

Download Debian, Slackware or Redhat. Burn disk. Insert in
cdrom drive. Reboot and follow the prompts. Come out from behind
the Iron Curtain and join the Free world!

There. That feels better now.
:cool:

meh, the pirates will find this "reduced functionality" code and give it a lobotomy before the month is out.

There was/is an "Education" hook function in windows. Allowed for a programmer to write educational software that would be helpful in granting full control over the students computer to the teacher, or teaching software. Full control? Helpful? Really helpful if your writing a virus. I wonder how this Reduced Functionality feature works.

I wonder how it will be exploited?

I presume this means activated versions of Vista?

Hi Moira,

Quote:

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I presume this means activated versions of Vista?

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Yes, otherwise you wouldn't be contacting Microsoft and they wouldn't spot it.

I think that the same mechanism is used by the OS if you don't activate it within the required timespan.

As far as I can tell, MS don't actually "do" anything, as the functionality is already within the OS. All they have done is introduced a mechanism that will activate it.

Makes you wonder what else is "waiting in the wings" to be exploited before MS get round to it. I cannot believe that MS are paying any attention to the security of features they are not using.................. but they are still there.:shocked:

So is this for all pirated copies, or just ones released recently after this mechanism was thought up? And if you know the key of your product, I suppose all you can do is hope that when it's activated it isn't one that MS recognise is stolen. Best thing is never to activate ...... (I do have two bought copies of Vista btw!)

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Best thing is never to activate

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I don't think that is an option, is it? Wouldn't you
get the "reduced functionality" problem for refusing
to activate?

The real problem here is what what happens if the
bad guys get into Microsoft's WGA servers and maliciously
attack large numbers of normal users by arbitrarily
refusing to validate them. As I understand it (I'm paranoid),
You don't just validate once, it's an ongoing process.
Your genuine system may fail validation at some future time,
due to a bug on their end.

Remember, you are only leasing the software, you do not
own your copy. You must continue to comply.
:cool:

How would MS know you'd refused to activate? OK, I'll admit that one of my copies of Vista is Vista Ultimate, downloaded as an experiment to see if I could get the crack to work that stopped that countdown. So far it's counted down to 27 days, (God knows why) and this goes back to November. TweakVI reveals the key so if it did start to count down, I could enter that. I'm just wondering if I'd get the dreaded black screen! Hell, I already have a problem with firefox periodically giving me black screens anyway, along with Visual Studio, and as I said, I have two legit copies of Vista. This other one is only on a 20 gig partition which was set up just to test betas - the PC mainly runs XP as that's what the users are most happy with.

I don't think Microsoft needs to know that you
refused to activate. I thought it was built into the OS,
that if you fail to activate, it will automatically go into
the "reduced functionality" mode. Otherwise this is all an
idle threat, and piracy will thrive as usual.

Yeah, that's if it counts down from 30 days. I've managed successfully to stop the timer and with changing a few registry names have so far avoided MS disabling this. So Vista Ultimate is stuck at 27 days to activation and as long as it doesn't reach zero, they couldn't possibly even be aware that I'd installed it.

Hmmm the screen goes black after an hour the start menu just disappears on it's own... Wait a minute, they had a button to turn Vista into Windows 95 ??????

=O

Or ME ..... but hey, Vista is worse and buggier than even Me at it's height right now. Peculiar things happen which you simply can't troubleshoot because they don't make sense.

Hi Moira,

Firstly, might I appologise for my bad manners in not asking after you and yours in my last post. You have not been here so regularly, I hope it is holidays and happy events that are to blame :D

Quote:

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So is this for all pirated copies, or just ones released recently after this mechanism was thought up?

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As I understand things, this mechanism is embedded in the Windows OS. So, if you have a "standard pirate copy", that will still be in there waiting to happen.

In general, all pirates do is try to circumvent the authentication process.......... they don't look at what happens after that.

Quote:

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Best thing is never to activate

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Ah! I think that there might be a slight misunderstanding here? The "activation" is different from "registration" . If you do not "activate" then it will die.............. the registration is optional (although I always do it) and has no effect on the functionality.

Subsequently, the WGA mechanism will "authenticate" the installation. That would be when they check for stolen keys and such, I would imagine.

Pirates can probably circumvent the initial acivation, but then you are on your own. If the installation fails a subsequent validation (which is what this is) you get flagged as a pirate.

This would be all well and good if M$ could write decent software for their DRM.............. but they obviously can't :)

Well, I'm amazed my copy is still going tbh .... I only did it to see if I could. I allow updates to download but look at what is going to install first. I can't imagine why it lost 3 days (?) not the sort of thing you can ask about generally is it? :)

I've had a bit of a rough time lately actually - problems with my rheumatoid arthritis and the subsequent medication have accounted for a few "lost" days recently, and I've also got an operation coming up to sew back together my ruptured achilles tendon, which is going to need muscle grafting as the ends have contracted too much to meet. It'll mean 3 months in plaster, 2 weeks full leg plaster and then intensive physio afterwards. That's on October 2nd - the only light at the end of the tunnel is a trip to New Zealand in February. The main cause of this rupture was taking high doses of steroids for pain relief (iatrogenic diseases I think they're called, ie treatment induced).

So you have RA and if they gave you real Pain Killers you wouldn't need surgery now? Awesome!

I know how you feel, believe me. PT isn't fun, I got to stuff my leg into a burning hot pool of water (I don't even take hot showers because I like water to be either cool or warm, but not anywhere near hot) so my leg was burned up the whole time and then they made me move it in what seemed to be the same manner people use to get secrets out of people all the while refusing to give me anything for it even after one of the girls working on me recommended it to the Dr after seeing what was actually going on inside my bone... Well what was left of it, the ankle bone was shattered and had fragments floating around rubbing into things making it hurt even if it wasn't being moved.

Still refused anything. They offered me Motrin and two other things I'm deathly allergic too which is WELL documented in my file as the cortizone shot they said "try or don't get anything at all" put me in the ER after I turned bright red and my skin was hot to touch and my breathing wasn't anywhere near normal... Which finally made them believe I was telling the truth when I said "No really, I'm allergic to those".

All it took was me almost dying in the ER :) Cool huh? And I still didn't get anything lol. Funny how it's illegal to give to much but not illegal to give nothing of anything that may actually work and just let someone suffer.

Well, I was getting dihydrocodeine as well, but my urgent referral to the pain management clinic was still not producing an appointment after 3 months - the specialist, by the time I did see him, said my pain had been mismanaged ending up with me on a ridiculous amount of dhc. The fact that he'd taken 3 months to see me didn't seem to occur to him!

Now I'm on methadone, which has its own problems, believe me. First, I feel like a drug addict and second, I *am* addicted to it because you can't physically take the stuff on a regular basis and not be. I get a month's supply at once and it's sooooo hard to stick to the prescribed amounts and not take a bit extra, hence the last few days of the month have seen me off work and in bed with withdrawal symptoms. But I refuse to ask for the script early as apparently they give you one more chance if you do that, then take you off the programme and this is so much more effective then dihydrocodeine.

It's also going to create problems with my operation - you aren't allowed to bring any controlled drugs into hospital with you, so presumably they'll give me what I need, but I'm being blind dosed (ie I don't know what I'm getting and give feedback every month, while they vary the dose), so that's going to be fun for the anaesthetist. It's also going to be fun for the plane journey to New Zealand :( imagine getting through security with a liquid which is also a controlled drug! And my main treatment, the methotrexate is injections which I carry around - we stop in Dubai and I've got visions of ending up in Death Row for drug trafficking!

Methadone shouldn't make you feel like an addict, you have a need for something, and you have it for that reason. Methadone is usually associated with addicts because that's what they use to treat Heroin addiction.

They do that because Methadone was invented in Germany during WW2 because they were short on Morphine for soldiers which was also synthesized the first time in Germany by William Suertenur looking for a way to make Opium stronger and when they ran short, they invented Methadone as a pain killer similar to Morphine, but it doesn't work as well, but DOES have a WAY longer half life.

Half life means the amount of time before half the dose is in your body. Most Opiates have a short half life but Methadone doesn't, it stays in the body longer, so therefore it makes it easier to treat addicts to Heroin as they aren't craving every 8 to 12 hours and can get off the idea of needing something that quickly, and also it's a lot less potent than most Opiates, meaning even though it does have pain killing effects as do all Opiates, it's not very strong and therefore has a smaller chance of addiction as there isn't really a "high" from it because of the low strength.

For what it's worth, where you're going has stronger meds over the counter in terms of pain relief, but I don't recommend buying any as then that's mixing which can be dangerous to say the least. As long as you remember to call ahead to tell them your situation and ask what you need to bring to prove you have a valid script (like for example the papers that it came with) you shouldn't have a problem.

You should be able to call and ask though and tell them what is happening and what you have a script for, and they can let you know for sure what you can do so you won't have any problems or hand cuffs.

I do recommend the phone call though, it'll save you an hour of questions when you get there lol. Just be honest and flat out with them of what has happened, and you'll be fine.

Not very strong? While I agree with most of what you're saying, it was a toss up whether I got methadone or morphine, but my consultant was going to make the strength of whichever roughly the same, ie better than dihydrocodeine mainly due to the longer active nature of both drugs (the morphine would have been slow release).

I'm afraid it does make me feel good, just takes off life's rough edges, makes everything in the garden feel rosy and you look at life through rose coloured specs. And try suddenly stopping it! Talk about feeling rough! I can stand it for a couple of days, but then it just wears me down and I only want to take sleeping pills and stay in bed. Or I buy some legal stimulants to counter the crap effects and then feel crap in turn when they wear off. Methadone happens to be very addictive IMHO - just better for addicts as it's less open to abuse (assuming it's the suspension made from methadone powder). It also acts for longer as you say. But apparently it's also a very good pain reliever for RA, and it works very well for me. But I'm not naturally good at self control and I do find sticking to the prescribed plan very difficult at times :(

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Originally Posted by Aardpsymon

meh, the pirates will find this "reduced functionality" code and give it a lobotomy before the month is out.

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They already have. Its been on "the usual places" for about a month now. You can find anything on IRC.

Ryan


btw, I can tell you it works fine too.

Well, if M$ are to be believed, this functionality has not been activated ........... yet ...........

http://www.computerworld.com/action/...icleId=9035918

My suspicion is they are having difficulty in implementing it, which would tie in with the false positives that happened a few days ago?

I agree, it's a bit difficult to be sure something works that hasn't yet been implemented. I'd rather my copy just didn't get activated really as I don't trust the key. There again, in a way I might as well know with it one way or the other. Since it's just an experiment, I'm not too bothered if it does start to count down, but I won't encourage it or activate with the revealed key by TweakXI.

There again, I have backup images of the install I could probably roll back to if I was prepared to keep doing that on a 30 day basis.

http://ars.userfriendly.org/cartoons/?id=20070915

LOL if I started trademarking my one liners I'd be a rich man ;) And then, I'd buy a Sun box. Like the Sunfire, it's a nice little box and is actually half the price of a Mac desktop :)

That's a fantastic cartoon! Yes, people probably wouldn't notice any difference in Vista - I get black screens now.

Presumably this reduced functionality happens only once, then when you reboot it's just black screens etc straight away.

Hi Moira,

Quote:

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I get black screens now.................... Presumably this reduced functionality happens only once, then when you reboot it's just black screens etc straight away.

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As I understand it, the black screen should happen after one hour. This is for "pirated software", which I suspect M$ regard as:

1. Legitimate software that has been copied and sold as genuine.
2. Small OEM's pre-loaded software that has not been paid for (multiple installations, & unlicenced installations).

In both of those cases there is a distinct possibility that the user is an innocent dupe.

M$ are after the pirates, not their innocent customers, so they are prepared to be somewhat accommodating, particularly if it leads to them catching the pirates who are costing them money.

On the other hand, if you interfere with the activation date countdown, you are certainly not innocent.............................:eek::D

Does anyone have a pirated copy of Vista? And by Pirated I do not mean the ISO you copied from your roommate. I mean a copy you or a friend has purchased off the street for $20 or downloaded from [insert P2P network name]

If you do have a pirated copy, does it work?

Read the thread dinowuff! And nihil that still didn't answer my question.

Also, it isn't my cracked copy of Vista that gives me black screens - that has a mouse issue but otherwise works perfectly (it refuses to recognise a Microsoft mouse until I cancel the message boxes after which it works as normal).

Sorry Moira,

I think that the reduced functionality applies as soon as the installation is deemed "pirate", but it will work for one hour before the black screen on subsequent reboots.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Moira

Read the thread dinowuff! And nihil that still didn't answer my question.

Also, it isn't my cracked copy of Vista that gives me black screens - that has a mouse issue but otherwise works perfectly (it refuses to recognise a Microsoft mouse until I cancel the message boxes after which it works as normal).

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I did read the thread. English is my first language. Bad English is my second.

Summary of Thread.
OP:

Quote:

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If any of you are running a pirated version of Vista, MS has activated a new "Reduced Functionality

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Short time later:

Quote:

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Methadone shouldn't make you feel like an addict

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Little while after that:

Quote:

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That's a fantastic cartoon!

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Then, referring to the OP:

Quote:

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Does anyone have a pirated copy of Vista?

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Here's the confusing part:

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Read the thread dinowuff!

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So WTF do you need help with? Vista or your addiction to pain medication?

IIRC this isn't a thread where anyone's asking for help. It's just a thread commenting on M$ introducing reduced functionality for pirated copies of Vista that went slightly off topic at one point!

nihil some people could live with that - it might suit families trying to restrict internet access for the kids :) give them an hour's browsing each night.

Oh great now you said that and they're going to start selling it as child protection software instead of a disabling feature....

LOL .... I don't think Vista owners are taking this very seriously. We've endured months of Microsoft's disabling features, it's called Home Premium or Ultimate. We've just learned to get rouind the disabling features (like cancelling two or three warning messages about the incompatibility of my M$ mouse) after which it works perfectly :) And black screens aren't quite a disabling feature yet ........... obviously there would come a time when I'd reinstall but I'm nowhere near that.

Quote:

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IIRC this isn't a thread where anyone's asking for help. It's just a thread commenting on M$ introducing reduced functionality for pirated copies of Vista that went slightly off topic at one point!

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Off topic???? Where Dinowuff and I come from, off topic is going from asking for help with your printer to talking about your grandmothers favortie position...in the same post.

Off topic is good, it means people are not taking things too seriously.

I totally agree with you Nokia, it just sounded like Dinowuff was complaining. I'll forgive him though, because he has such a wonderful sounding nick! :D

Why are we Pirating Vista anyway... isn't there better operating Systems? Faster and more reliable. Linux?

I actually have a copy of Vista, but it came on the computer. It looks a little better but still operates like XP. Networking is about 20 x harder to figure out and it always asks you to verifies twice if you want to make changes...

There has got to be something better.

Vista is very much like XP once you get used to it. It's nothing like the change between Windows 95 and XP for instance. Aero window switching is nice, but underneath, there are very few changes that the average user is going to be aware of - once you turn that irritating UAC off anyway!

Networking is easier in the sense that Vista sees other PCs on the network and connects to them without effort, but it then makes it ridiculously hard to see the contents of a folder on the network unless it's in Users\Public.

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Originally Posted by Moira

It's nothing like the change between Windows 95 and XP for instance.

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Lol...Now that's an understatement if I ever heard one...I think you missed a few? (Win 98 and Win 2000) so yeah the changes between 95 and XP is extremely big...:bigpimp: