Windows 7 has yet to even be released officially to the general public, and already the dodgy folk on the Internet have fully cracked and activated the Ultimate version, with help from a leaked Lenovo OEM
DVD .ISO file.
The news comes from website My Digital Life who state that you can already pass Windows Genuine Advantage validation offline, OEM style.
The leaked .ISO was originally posted on a Chinese forum, which was then downloaded in order for people to get hold of the boot.wim, and in turn retrieving the OEM-SLP key, plus the OEM activation certificate. Microsoft uses the same digitally signed OEM certificate, which has an .xrm-ms extension, as that in Windows Vista. Another point to note is that the key is a master one, which can be used to activate other OEM branded installations, like ones from Dell, HP or indeed Lenovo.
This is quite concerning; as mentioned, Windows 7 has yet to even be released, and it can be fully activated. This demonstrates the risk such a huge company as Microsoft takes when distributing a product as significant as an operating system, but this was essentially inevitable, regardless. It's interesting that a product can be pirated and activated before it's properly released to customers.
Microsoft was not available for comment at the time of writing.
(NeoWin)