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All those looking for a free key to run Windows 8 Pro can abandon their searches on torrents and other resources. Microsoft itself has... Microsoft Gives Windows 8 Keys to Pirates by Accident

All those looking for a free key to run Windows 8 Pro can abandon their searches on torrents and other resources. Microsoft itself has made the free keys available to the customers through its own website. What you need to do is visit Microsoft’s website and download your own copy of Windows 8 and they won’t charge you a dime. It does sound too good to be true and it probably is. So, you must be wondering how did this happen?

Well, it isn’t exactly Microsoft offering visitors the chance to download Windows 8 for free. After all, the company has spent millions of dollars making it and many more on promoting it over the past year or so. It would be extremely insensible of them do such a thing. So, if you were thinking that Microsoft had suddenly become benevolent, you are wrong.

Microsoft Gives Windows 8 Keys to Pirates by Accident

 

The way you can exploit the little glitch on the Microsoft website is by downloading a Microsoft Media Center upgrade. As of now, the upgrade is available free of cost and will be there till the 31st of January. What’s interesting about the upgrade is when you download it Windows 8 Pro gets activated on your computer. It isn’t just a temporary thing. Once activated, the Windows 8 Pro is activated for good and you can use it without paying a dime.

Obviously, this is a mistake on part of Microsoft and they must have done it by accident. How else would you imagine the tech giant providing its current flagship product to customers for free? It is only a matter of time before the company realizes what has happened and rectifies the situation. So, you have to act quickly if you want to benefit from this glitch on the Microsoft website.

However, the Windows 8 Pro works for only 180 days after activation. After that, the key you entered to make it work expires and the operating system has to be reactivated. The users who manage to get Windows 8 Pro to work on their computers through the current anomaly would be able to use it for six months, no longer. Also, the users won’t be able to share activation keys since the new OS doesn’t use volume keys for activation.

So, while Microsoft may have unknowingly provided Windows 8 Pro keys to pirates for free, the structure of the operating system prevents the piracy from going beyond a certain limit. In the meanwhile, Microsoft can work on repairing the problem.

 

[Image via atomicmpc]