Help, help.
I turn on my computer and every time I do the attached shows up. I have scanned with various anti-malware and nothing shows up. Here is what comes up each turn-on time.
Any ideas. Is this really from Microsoft or is it a scam or what.
Thanks
Ron
Nine times out of ten that is because you are using a volume licence key not generally available to public.
Run "slmgr /dlv" from an admin command prompt and tell us what it says aftet text "Product Key Channel"?
Not sure what you mean. All I know is I upgraded from Windows 7 a long time ago and have had NO problems with any "activation" before. I am concerned that this is some sort of a scam or an unwanted program. It certainly just started to pop up. Nothing is showing up on "services" or in Startup folder or any where else.
Thanks
Ron
In a command window slmgr /xpr will give either of these 2 images. The 1st is for regular consumer pcs, the 2nd is for volume licensed machines - yours should be the top one.
My understanding of volume activation is that there are 2 types -
1: computer belongs to an organization and the pc connects to the company server (usually daily) to reactivate. This activation lasts 180 days, so the pc can be taken home, away on business etc, and it will stay activated. There's also a method where the pc connects to Microsoft to do this. Either way, when queried it shows 6 month's activation.
2: there's also hack methods to get a free copy of Windows 10 that emulates # 1. People sometimes buy a 2nd hand pc that appears to be legit, but is in fact a pirate copy using this KMS hack method. Windows defender detects these hack methods as a virus (even though it isn't) and deletes the hack files. This often goes unnoticed until the 180 days grace approaches, and you get messages like the one in post #1.
AFAIK, regular Joe Public doesn't get to own volume pcs, so your computer is either a company one or bent. It's not unknown for someone with a legit pc who's having activation problems for some reason, to go online and find a pirate hack that fixes it, only for the hack to fail further down the line.
Your Windows 7 was almost certainly using a volume licence key with illegal activation software to fool Windows into thinking it had contacted a genuine company activation server. It was a common scam on Windows 7 for pc sellers to do this as it meant they paid nothing for the licence but charged end users.
However, this illegal activation software often does not survive all Windows 10 upgrades and eventually licence expires.
Sometimes this occurs if a user legitimately buys a pc from a Company but the Company does not provide an alternative licence - they are supposed to do that or wipe pc if they do not permit access to their activation servers.
Generally, it means you need to buy a licence unless you can get redress from original vendors which is unlikely after several years.
Well I don't know what happened when it showed and now I don't know what is happening now. I just downloaded and installed my up date and now the "warning" has disappeared .
I thank you very much for your help, but now all is working fine so I plan to close this thread so others can be helped.
Thanks again
Ron
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