Cheap Windows licence keys on eBay - are they legit?

Bob24

Hi,

I have a Windows VM on my Mac for the odd times when I need to run a Windows application. The VM is still running Windows XP as I'd rather have a properly licensed copy and never wanted to pay 100+ euros for an upgrade given how rarely I use the VM.

I saw there are sellers on eBay selling cheap licences, such as this one:
http://www.ebay.ie/itm/Windows-8-1-Professional-Pro-32-64-bit-license-key-FREE-UPGRADE-TO-WINDOWS-10-/331717305185?hash=item4d3be46361:g:PJwAAOSw37tV~q5v

Anyone knows whether those are genuine Microsoft licence keys and how these sellers are getting them that cheap compared to the official price?

I know when something is too cheap on eBay there usually is a (bad) reason, but I see these guys mostly have positive feedback and as long as the key activates with Microsoft I am wondering what could be wrong ...

Cheers.

me_irl

Have you tried running WINE to run windows applications on the Mac?

https://www.winehq.org/

Alarm bells would definitely go off by selling windows keys for only 20e.

Bob24

Cheers.

I did use Crossover at some point (which I think is pretty much a fancier package for Wine) and I found compatibility to be hit and miss. I think it is great if there is an application you use regularly and which is well supported. But in my case it is more for once off situations when I need something which is not well supported on OSX or want to test something on a Windows environment. Doesn't happen very often but when it does I prefer to have a full Windows environment running in a silo which I know will be fully native and compatible rather than emulated APIs.

Fysh

It's eBay, positive feedback has nothing to do with the legitimacy or otherwise of the goods. The going rate for a legit windows licence key starts at around £70 for the home version. Anything less than that and you're in sketchy territory, and whether or not it activates you're probably not getting a legitimate licence.

If you're not keen on paying that sort of price for a rarely used VM you could install 7 as a trial and use the slmgr -rearm trick to reset the activation status - that'll give you up to 90 days of working trial install. Not perfect, but unless you've got a load of configuration/setup to do you can probably script up whatever bits need installing/configuring after the OS install is done. (I say 7 as I'm not sure if the same can be done with 8 or 10). Alternatively, the Windows Server trial installs are good for 180 days at a time, but they may not suit your requirements.

PropJoe10

They are probably MSDN keys being sold on eBay which I'm sure would be very much against Microsoft's terms of service, so could be cancelled at any time. If I was you, I'd probably stick with my XP VM, and take regular snapshots so that you can restore to a snapshot if anything goes wrong. No real harm in it.

Bob24

Thanks folks. MSDN keys is probably what it is. I don't think I'll chance it and will keep beeing cheap holding onto my old XP licence for now.

One more question though as I will need to upgrade at some point (don't think XP will be supported by recent software for much longer anymore): do you know if all editions of Windows 10 can run on a VM? I seem to remember it was not the case for previous versions but couldn't find details on the Microsoft website. And also, if you scrap a Windows 10 VM and want to reuse your licences on a new VM, will Microsoft let you activate Windows again with the same key in that new VM?

NomadicGray

I actually only bought that key off that supplier last night, hadnt seen your thread until now.

Got the key within the hour, installed 8.1 fine, windows was happy it was legit & then I upgraded to 10. For some reason I never got the free upgrade to 10 from 7, needed a new install so decided to go about it this way

Fysh

Bob24 wrote: »

Thanks folks. MSDN keys is probably what it is. I don't think I'll chance it and will keep beeing cheap holding onto my old XP licence for now.

One more question though as I will need to upgrade at some point (don't think XP will be supported by recent software for much longer anymore): do you know if all editions of Windows 10 can run on a VM? I seem to remember it was not the case for previous versions but couldn't find details on the Microsoft website. And also, if you scrap a Windows 10 VM and want to reuse your licences on a new VM, will Microsoft let you activate Windows again with the same key in that new VM?

You should be able to. If you reactivate repeatedly within a short period you may need to go through phone-based activation, but a non-OEM licence won't be tied to anything in particular and so long as you stay within the number of allowed instances you can reinstall and reactivate to your heart's content

Bob24

Fysh wrote: »

You should be able to. If you reactivate repeatedly within a short period you may need to go through phone-based activation, but a non-OEM licence won't be tied to anything in particular and so long as you stay within the number of allowed instances you can reinstall and reactivate to your heart's content

Great, thanks!

unkel

NomadicGray wrote: »

Got the key within the hour, installed 8.1 fine, windows was happy it was legit & then I upgraded to 10

It activated because it was a valid key. Your installation is not legit though!

NomadicGray wrote: »

For some reason I never got the free upgrade to 10 from 7

Perhaps you were running W7 without SP1. In that case the upgrade would not come up by itself and a manual upgrade with installation media wouldn't work either

NomadicGray

No idea, Windows 7 was fully up to date though, so surely that would have included sp1.
Makes no odds now anyways as I'm on 10 and pretty happy with it.

unkel

If for some reason you disabled the SP1 update (as simple as unticking a single box once), then it would not have presented itself again for installation. Any other updates would still have presented, leaving you with the impression that you were fully up to date. If I were a betting man, I'd say that was the case

And your Windows 10 is working now and chances are you'll never run into trouble (it's in MS interest to get as many people to W10 as quickly as possible). You'll be fine probably but that does not make your installation legit

If you're bothered to make it legit, uninstall W10 (this will bring you back to W7 - make sure it is still activated and if not, activate it). Then install SP1 and install the upgrade to W10

blorg

My understanding is that these keys are resale, whether OEM or bulk licenses or whatever. Yes under Microsoft's EULA you can't do this but under EU copyright law Microsoft CANNOT restrict resale rights for software through a EULA. This is the first sale doctrine (US) / exhaustion of IP rights principle (EU), the rightholder's rights over a specific copy are exhausted by the first sale. This has long been the legal position in the EU and has been validated over and over by the courts through the last two decades. Once Microsoft sell the software, in the EU, they cannot restrict resale through a license.

EULAs were an attempted legal end-run around the first sale doctrine which has been a principle of copyright for literally centuries. This was allowed by US courts but was rejected in Europe.

Those clauses in the license attempting to restrict resale are simply invalid, in the EU. Once they sell the software, the person buying it can do what they like with it, including reselling it. You'll note that almost all these eBay cheap key sellers tend to always be in the EU, and that's because it's legal in the EU and it's not legal in the US.

https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20120703/11345519566/eu-court-says-yes-you-can-resell-your-software-even-if-software-company-says-you-cant.shtml

https://www.theregister.co.uk/2002/05/08/selling_oem_windows_copies_you/

https://www.itassetmanagement.net/2016/10/31/secondary-software-2016/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exhaustion_of_intellectual_property_rights

So it is legit, in the sense it is legal under EU law. And this includes reselling OEM copies without the hardware. Microsoft doesn't like it, and they put an unenforceable clause in the EULA saying you can't do it, but it is legit to resell software keys, even if the license attempts to restrict this.

Think about it for a second, eBay is a very large, legit company and these license keys are sold completely and utterly openly on the platform. Do you not think, with all the extraordinary efforts put into shutting down or blocking the likes of the Pirate Bay that Microsoft would not have been able to stop this happening on eBay if it were in fact illegal?

Capt'n Midnight

Anyway over 90% of windows licences are OEM and are bound to the motherboard.

It's a licence to use something Microsoft still own.

They charge a lot more for the non-OEM versions that can be transferred.



ebay are not legit in the sense that you'll find lots of illegal stuff there.

Fysh

blorg wrote: »

My understanding is that these keys are resale, whether OEM or bulk licenses or whatever. Yes under Microsoft's EULA you can't do this but under EU copyright law Microsoft CANNOT restrict resale rights for software through a EULA. This is the first sale doctrine (US) / exhaustion of IP rights principle (EU), the rightholder's rights over a specific copy are exhausted by the first sale. This has long been the legal position in the EU and has been validated over and over by the courts through the last two decades. Once Microsoft sell the software, in the EU, they cannot restrict resale through a license.

EULAs were an attempted legal end-run around the first sale doctrine which has been a principle of copyright for literally centuries. This was allowed by US courts but was rejected in Europe.

Those clauses in the license attempting to restrict resale are simply invalid, in the EU. Once they sell the software, the person buying it can do what they like with it, including reselling it. You'll note that almost all these eBay cheap key sellers tend to always be in the EU, and that's because it's legal in the EU and it's not legal in the US.

https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20120703/11345519566/eu-court-says-yes-you-can-resell-your-software-even-if-software-company-says-you-cant.shtml

https://www.theregister.co.uk/2002/05/08/selling_oem_windows_copies_you/

https://www.itassetmanagement.net/2016/10/31/secondary-software-2016/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exhaustion_of_intellectual_property_rights

So it is legit, in the sense it is legal under EU law. And this includes reselling OEM copies without the hardware. Microsoft doesn't like it, and they put an unenforceable clause in the EULA saying you can't do it, but it is legit to resell software keys, even if the license attempts to restrict this.

Think about it for a second, eBay is a very large, legit company and these license keys are sold completely and utterly openly on the platform. Do you not think, with all the extraordinary efforts put into shutting down or blocking the likes of the Pirate Bay that Microsoft would not have been able to stop this happening on eBay if it were in fact illegal?

If you're seriously trying to claim that eBay scrupulously checks each and every seller on there and acts to prevent people selling things that are unlawful without first having had (numerous) reports or complaints from companies whose IP is being infringed, you need to read more.

Side note: the general legal sketchiness of EULAs does not mean that a product sold on eBay for less than 10% of its RRP will somehow count as a legitimate licence. If Microsoft don't chase after you for using an El Cheapo eBay windows licence, it's because they mainly care about auditing businesses for infringement in a commercial context, because that's more financially relevant. It has very little to do with them being afraid that Their Team Of Lawyers will somehow be defeated by An Bloke Citing Wikipedia and fifteen-year-old El Reg articles.