Microsoft plans to give some pirates a break
As part of its growing antipiracy campaign, Microsoft is testing a program that offers free licensed versions of Windows XP Professional to some customers whose copies are found to be bogus.
The move is the latest in a series of expansions for the Windows Genuine Advantage program, which Microsoft quietly launched last September. The program, which runs software that verifies whether a particular copy of Windows is legitimately licensed, is the linchpin of a campaign by Microsoft to boost the number of paying customers among the millions of people that use Windows. The Windows Genuine effort started as a purely voluntary program, but Microsoft has since been requiring validation for more and more customers who want to download software from the company.
In March, for example, Microsoft said it would require those who want to download a foreign-language pack for Windows to first validate their copy of Windows.
