Windows Genuine Advantage

      Genuine Crap
    
    Imagine me saying that with a deep Scottish accent. What the hell am I talking about? Well actually I'm talking about Windows Genuine Advantage or WGA for short. Now some of you might be blissfully unaware of it's existence which probably means you're running either a genuine version of Windows or a very well- hacked version of it. The rest of you have probably encountered it, and you know just how annoying it can be.

      What the hell is WGA ?

    Well WGA is a program/spyware/thingy from Microsoft with the alias of being an anti-piracy system. It enforces MS Windows online validation when trying to download certain updates or other programs from MS. WGA covers Windows 2000, Windows XP, and Vista. It doesn't cover Server 2003 and the Win 9x family. At first it was an optional feature which you were asked if you wanted to install, but later on it became mandatory if you wished to obtain programs or upgrades for Windows from MS. In April of 2006 MS began ditributing WGA as "critical update" KB905474 through Windows Update effectively annoying milions of users .

      What does it do?

    I kept saying until now that it is extremely anoying, and now let me explain why. The WGA validation process validates the present installation of Windows and its license key against the hardware involved. It is accessible by either a stand-alone program, or as an ActiveX control within Internet Explorer, the latter of which is relevant to any attempt to access Microsoft updates via its browser.
    If successful in validating Windows, it stores a special license file on the PC for future verification.
    If an instance of Windows does not seem to have a valid license, WGA displays a specific notice to the user and prevents "non-Critical" updates from being downloaded from Microsoft. At least this is the official version. In fact it blocks all updates except the new versions of WGA and displays pop-up warnings that you may be running a counterfeit copy. Another syndrom is the computer locking up whenever you try to access IE. Now this is not official but it happened on different machines that had not passed the test.
    On Windows Vista, WGA validation failure has a greater impact. In addition to persistent notification and the disabling of "non-critical updates", WGA also disables Windows Aero, Windows Defender, and ReadyBoost. The user is given a grace period in which to then pass validation, after which most of the operating system is disabled and Windows reverts to reduced functionality mode, which will suposedly be removed in Service Pack 1 of Windows Vista.

      Other info

    Now I mentioned this as "spyware" from Microsoft. And I am not the only one. Why? Well because it is installed and acts exactly as a spyware program. First MS tells you it's a critical security update, which in fact it is not. It does not ,resolve or notify or have any connection with any system vulnerability. Secondly it collects data from your computer and "calls home" once a day sending that data back to MS. At first no one even knew what info it was sending but later they broke it into bits and this is what this little tool sends each day :

-> Computer make and model
-> BIOS checksum.
-> MAC address.
-> A unique number assigned to your computer by the tools (Globally Unique Identifier or GUID)
-> Hard drive serial number.
-> Region and language settings of the operating system.
-> Operating system version.
-> PC BIOS information (make, version, date).
-> PC manufacturer.
-> User locale setting.
-> Validation and installation results.
-> Windows or Office product key.
-> Windows XP/ Vista product ID.

    After heavy accusations and criticism directed at the Redmond based company, MS said that future versions of WGA would only "phone home" once every two weeks, and also came up with removal instructions for WGA. Unfortunately those didn't work for the machines I tried them on.
    Now, another issue with WGA is that is has a tendancy of giving out false positives. Meaning it doesn't identify genuine copies of Windows as being so. This actually has happened to me on another machine with an XP Pro GENUINE instalation.
According to an editorial on the arstechnica.com technology website, WGA reported around 22% of 500 million Windows computers as failing the test; of these less than 0.5% were due to pirated software, with the balance (over 20%, or 90% of all positives) related to non piracy issues. Microsoft "refused to comment on the rate of pure false positives" beyond saying it was "under 1%" (or as stated, at most around 5 million users affected).

      How to fix it!


    Now there were many ways and ideas out on the net on how to get rid of the wga tool. Unfortunately MS quickly found most of them, and complained thus effectively shutting down the sites that hosted such sollutions. A good last place where you can find info and sollutions on this problem is this one. I did try some of their recomandations but they didn't work for me. The second place where you can actually find something useful is Softpedia. You can actually download a WGA removal tool here. I did use this one and it did the trick.

    Disclaimer: I did say before, that I like Windows and that I especially like Vista and it is true. But not the same goes for MS. While I do believe that every coder and person that has worked o a project should get payed, I also believe that no student should have to pay around 600$ in total just to be able to use MS Office to do his projects. And yes I know there are some alternatives out there, but what can really substitute Windows when it comes to compatibility and availability?
By the way if the original copy of your Windows looks something like this, " You may be a victim of software counterfeiting".

That being said I hope this article was useful for a few people.
Cheers, Geeky.