You may have bought and paid for Windows XP. But Microsoft decides whether or not you can use it.
If your XP software is up-to-date and online, it negotiates its validity with Microsoft servers every day. Nothing personal. Just part of Microsoft’s Digital Rights Management (DRM) system protecting Redmond’s property… checking to see if your Windows software (and heaven only knows what else) is perfectly valid.
Evoking memories of RealNetworks efforts to protect themselves from their loyal customers, innocent Microsoft officials explained to the discoverer, Lauren Weinstein, that this constant DRM enforcer is obviously not a constant DRM enforcer.
Instead, they averred, the feature simply allows Microsoft to disable the validation checker, Windows Genuine Advantage (WGA), if it should ever malfunction. (After the damage wrought on music lovers’ computers by Sony-BMG’s DRM software, Microsofties apparently thought Windows imbibers might swallow this “we monitor our monitor for your protection” line of reasoning.)
Silly us. Like Weinstein, we figured the daily validation check might allow Microsoft to remotely monitor you or pull the plug on your system, should you ever displease them down the road… perhaps, by refusing to buy a mandated Windows update, or discontinuing a Windows subscription.
Indeed, Microsoft officials admitted that, in the process of validating, they trap the IP address and date/timestamp.
Thus, as Microsoft knows that laptop’s geographic location whenever it’s online, it’s easy to envision Homeland Security shadowing John Q. Public as he meanders across the country with his laptop… or Chinese authorities tracking a political dissident who had the temerity to use the word freedom.
And then, there’s Microsoft itself. In addition to adding more details about you to its information reservoir, the company is blatantly letting you know who really controls the computer you bought.
You’ve been owned.
Email Battles Backgrounder:
13 comments
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June 13th, 2006 at 4:27 pm
Mark
You may own the computer, but you do NOT own Windows. You paid for a LICENSE. That is, Microsoft is allowing you to use their software in exchange for money–but they still own the software. If you don’t want to agree to the terms of the LICENSE, remove Windows and use an alternative.
June 13th, 2006 at 5:14 pm
BJ Gillette
@Mark.
Licensing doesn’t require tracking you like a dog.
Like I said… you’ve been owned.
Nice to see you get it, along with the too-slowly growing community of Linux desktoppers.
June 13th, 2006 at 5:34 pm
slowmojoe
So what they are really saying is:
All your computers AND software are belong to us !!!
Get over it or die, you stinkin biotchees……
June 14th, 2006 at 1:31 am
Mark
I do “get it,” and what I said is the truth. If you want to steer clear of Microsoft snooping and spying, use an alternative. I’m not saying you have to use Linux.
If you aren’t going to take action yourself (i.e., sue them), then this post is just pointless.
June 14th, 2006 at 2:02 am
Mark
Is there any way to block your computer from sending and recieving this information using a firewall?
June 14th, 2006 at 8:03 am
BJ Gillette
@Mark.
Change happens when people really understand the proposition they’re buying into, whether it be licensing schemes that suddenly turn into people-trackers, or friendly social sites that sell your personal details, or e-commerce sites that lose your credit card information.
It may be OK to you to be owned, but I *am* doing something about it.
As regular Email Battles readers know, more and more of my company’s servers and processes have moved to more “license friendly” environments.
In the meantime, if you like paying for the priviledge of being someone else’s property, knock yourself out.
Pointless? Only to the clueless.
June 14th, 2006 at 7:06 pm
M. Adams
Microsoft has been doing things to your computer without your permission for a long time. I switched to Linux about 3 years ago for security reasons. After running Linux for a few months, I logged into hotmail, the same as I do everyday. Only this time, when I accessed my inbox, my browser popped up a message indicating that I was trying to download “adsclient31.dll” and what would I like to do with it.
I am not sure what adsclient31.dll is, but it sounds like something Microsoft was trying to install.
Not sure what would have happened if I had been running IE, but I don’t run Windows anymore so I doesn’t really matter to me.
Use Windows at your own risk.
June 14th, 2006 at 9:55 pm
BJ Gillette
@M.Adams.
Sage advice. But it’s not just Microsoft.
Same goes for all those giant and “free” email, search, and social sites.
Sadly, today’s users think all those services are offered up without any cost to them.
They couldn’t be more wrong.
June 15th, 2006 at 8:30 am
Jones
Mark -
If I hadn’t read this article, I probably wouldn’t have known about this. This post pointless? I think not.
June 15th, 2006 at 12:24 pm
Nishant
Ever read the EULA? You can see the EULAs here http://www.microsoft.com/legal/useterms/default.aspx. You dont own Windows XP (thats intellactual property n belongs to MS) copy you just paid for and own the LICENSE to use.
And about IP tracking… Almost all the webservers have the capability to track your IP address so you wont even know when your IP is getting tracked / logged.
Hope that helps
June 15th, 2006 at 2:59 pm
BJ Gillette
@Nishant.
re: “You dont own Windows XP…”
Sorry you had to check the EULA. I thought I already told you that.
And about IP tracking… For starters, a single webserver only knows where you *are*, not where you’ve been.
In addition… call me paranoid, Nishant, but I’m gonna guess that there’s a bit more trapped than an IP and datestamp.
As Mark so aptly put it (above), “If you want to steer clear of Microsoft snooping and spying, use an alternative.”
While MS paritsans could once spew that venom comfortably aware of no practical alternatives, Apple, Google, IBM, Linux desktoppers and others are closing the gap rapidly… finally.
In fact, I just posted an article to that effect: http://www.emailbattles.com/archive/battles/opsys_aaejcihhbf_d/.
OS competition is good for all of us.
June 18th, 2006 at 8:14 am
Frank
I’ve known about the increasingly more onerous MS EULA’s for a long time. Largely because of this, I started using Linux about 4 years ago, and the progress on the Linux desktop since then is absolutely amazing. Linux is not yet a complete Windows replacement, but it is getting to be SO close.
I stopped using Windows, except for a couple of legacy apps that I run under emulation, well over a year ago. (I run those few legacy apps on legally purchased copies of Win98 SE, by the way - one license for each machine I own.)
I also switched my small business over to Linux / Open Office / Mozilla and have run it that way for a year now. There IS NO NEED to put up with the MS EULA and its enforcement methods anymore.
Frank.
July 21st, 2008 at 4:43 pm
Casandra
Yes, If MS is told by the CIA to get data on everyone they will and can do it thru updates and Genuine advantage.
They can install an Update that is just spyware and looks at all your files on your hard disk and sends it to their server. Since you do not know what MS windows does you have no way of knowing this is happening.
Get Linux, The US government hates it because it has no deliberate back doors.