Filed under: Business, Internet, Windows, Microsoft
Counterfeit software dealers beware, Microsoft is on your tail
by Chris Gilmer Oct 31st 2006 at 4:11PM
Today Microsoft said that it had 55 legal cases started with dealers that have been accused of selling counterfeit software online. Microsoft said that this is the highest number of shakedowns to date, hitting the US, Germany, Netherlands, France, Britain, Argentina, Australia, Belgium, Korea, Mexico and Poland. Online sellers of the counterfeit Microsoft materials have been using eBay and auction sites to sell the materials. This is an extremely pressing issue for Microsoft--not only are they loosing money, but the software in question could be defective and potentially hazardous to users, leaving backdoors open for possible security breaches and identity thefts. Our friends at Microsoft investigated these counterfeit applications and found that 43% actually contained additional programs and code that is not part of the actual operating system! Wow! I know that Microsoft's software can be rather expensive at times, but is it really worth dealing with all the hassle counterfeit software can bring? Especially nowadays when we live online, and do practically everything on the World Wide Web including banking and purchasing. Pretty spooky stuff!
So, just how good at time waster games are you? Think you've got the stuff? Well, The World's Hardest Game 2.0 doesn't think you do.
Yes, amazingly, it's possible to have a sequel to a game called "The World's Hardest Game". It doesn't seem logically possible, since if the first one was actually the world's hardest, how could another one come along and share the moniker? It made me doubt the name in the first place. That is, until I tried the game.
The mechanics of the game are very simple. You are a small red square, ...
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
RAL said 5:41PM on 10-31-2006
Any Microsoft operating system downloaded or bought from shady websites is way to risky for me.
When you can go to Circuit City and buy a decent computer with everything for $349.89 there is just no reason to even go for counterfeit Microsoft materials.
Link to computer I was referring too. http://www.circuitcity.com/rpsm/oid/162430/bundleId/4646/rpem/ccd/bundleDetail.do?c=0&JSESSIONID=FHPVTrLFn3KhmySKnHXWjnKKHc4L5w!1341201314!1162334133789
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Mike Spurlock said 9:51PM on 10-31-2006
First time I won't have to worry about whether mine's genuine. Microshaft is out of my home and my company. Nearly 11,000 machines and none of them will run Vista. Won't hurt them much, but it won't help them either.
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Fabulo said 12:26AM on 11-01-2006
Think about all the potential hazardous things and harmful stuff that could be included in your pirated copy of windows.
Because an out of the box, no service pack, no patch official copy of windows is that much more secure (oh, wait, it is not)
Also, most of those "operations" present themselves a genuine, they are there to rip people off, not necessarily Microsoft, they sell pirated versions of Photoshop and 3dStudio and just about anything that sells.
And finally, I'm not sure anyone is loosing any money :)
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mente said 5:13AM on 11-01-2006
Our company always was afraid of illegal software. And now I read that our OS can be illegal? How I can check the legality of the software?
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RAL said 2:22PM on 11-01-2006
Windows Genuine Advantage(WGA)
http://www.microsoft.com/genuine/default.mspx?displaylang=en
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