Windows "Activators" are SKETCHY
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- čas přidán 27. 06. 2024
- These windows activators are some of the sneakier trojans I have seen. Avoid!
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I've made the decision to terminate the sponsorship deal that was originally in this video (edit pending).
Intro / Explanation 0:00
First Attempt: 5:32
Second 12:52
Third 17:30
This video was planned prior to the sponsorship, and I felt it was a good integration. The sponsor had no oversight into the editorial direction of the video and purely approved the pre-roll.
Disclaimer: The content in this video is for education and entertainment purposes to showcase the dangers of malware & malicious software. I do not encourage any form of illegal hacking, nor do I encourage the usage of game cheats, cracks or hacks.
Cracks are sometimes shown to highlight the dangers of software piracy, my content is not intended to teach anybody how to pirate, or maliciously hack.
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(C) Eric Parker 2024 - Věda a technologie
It's back... (also now unsponsored since that was a point of contention)
CZcams really does not allow piracy, or piracy discussion and getting this reinstated was a nightmare. As a result, comments on this video will be moderated more heavily than usual.
In reference to one tool that is apparently legitimate that I didn't mention, I actually didn't know it existed (it's been a while since I cared about windows piracy), and the main issue here is not the legitimacy of the tool, but the fact trying to download it is very likely to get malware.
this is not even piracy its fake it just tricks you
The tool is open source on github, how is trying to download it going to get malware?
@@TheNuttGuy Yes, quite a massive one
Alright, let me break this down: Minecraft support relies on an unnamed free and open-source tool to fix their licensing mess, which is conveniently hosted on Microsoft's own developer platform. And you're seriously telling me that downloading this tool, with its fully open and auditable source code, is somehow going to infect your system? Come on, man, get a grip on reality.
Let's not pretend we don't see what's going on here. You made this video to rake in affiliate cash by pushing shady Windows keys from sketchy stores. Microsoft has a history of going after people for dealing in these dodgy OEM keys, and you're out here endorsing a worse fix than straight-up piracy.
@@MyFedora u r talking about which tool
i also want to activate windows for free
"don't use a windows activator"
just use MAS, it works well
Came here to plug massgrave
Agreed the best and safer way to activate windows and office!
massgrave my beloved
Amen. +100 respect. I used to use certain other emulators but then I I just use MAS and fuck the rest lol
"CZcams doesnt allow crimes unless its for educational purposes"
Alright let me make a how to rob a bank tutorial
niestety tak youtube dziala, chociaz nie zawsze
Either said crack or cracks
Just make sure you say ,,in gta,,
Pirating Windows, Photoshop, games and movies is not a crime.
@@miro007istit is
We should question how a legitimate Windows key, worth over $100, is being sold for $10 by a legitimate vendor. Cheap keys may originate from hacked credit cards, bulk keys obtained from businesses, etc.; they aren't always what they seem to be.
Stolen ccs, source i work for fraud prevention at a bank, we get a lot of chargeback requests to Microsoft for windows keys.
they came from people who fell to tech support scams
OEM keys 99.99% of the times
@@greenumbrellacorp5744 sometimes, again though quite a lot, especially the PRO keys are supplied from fraud, however most home edition keys are OEM as you say.
microsoft doesnt run off database of keys, they run off an algorithm, id say they figured out the algorithm and can generate infinite keys. its worked this way since like windows 2000.
Activators are obsolete. Just use M.A.S, it is safer and straight to the point, and it also activates Office. Also, M.A.S doesn't trigger AVs, so you don't need to disable them.
What's MAS?
@@AquaCobaltMicrosoft activation script or massgrave I think
I use that regularly and find it quite safe. If you want to activate off-line though, you could use KMS underscore VL underscore All. It is also reasonably safe. It could trigger antivirus, but in my personal experience, all you have to do is make an exclusion folder. You may also have to exclude the file if you have renewing tasks. But it does no more than that.
Why y’all naming piracy shit in yt comments 😭
@@DesignationGlitch it’s no worse than the video creator advertising sketchy key sites.
i understand you want to get money off of this, but not evening mentioning massgrave which is free and open source and approved by the community. Instead you advertise 3rd party key sellers for a shitty OS.
Yeah, almost seems like the AD and the topic go hand in hand. Doesn't make sense to pay for the grey market keys when massgrave exists
That's a really good find! Thanks for sharing the knowledge of massgrave lolol
Damn bruh, Massgrave is op. Thank you brother.
I guess i gotta check it out
I love massgrave
"dont use a windows activator"
proceeds to run a ad about selling sketchy windows keys
There is a difference between potential malware and activating windows for a cheap price
@@King-Julien you can legit generate windows keys for free ,this whole video is a scam advocating for this shop lol
@@King-Julien'Cheap price' that was made cheap with stolen credit cards
I’ve used one of these websites to buy a win7 key, it worked, no malware no adware no credit card fraud.
I think you just got unlucky with the website
@@rkjj. I don't think you can keygen an online activation
Those key sites have been known to be sketchy (stolen credit cards used to purchase licenses, etc.) and shouldn't be recommended. I get that the probably pay good money but it's kinda disappointing to see you promoting them. Great video otherwise.
He accepted a contract and can't say anything negative.
@@soundsparkOh yeah that makes sense
This is a problem with marketplaces such as G2A, where users sell keys to other users. Keysfan does not seem to be a marketplace and instead looks as though you buy the keys directly from the company.
Vendors that sell the keys directly do not generally have the illegal keys problem and I am not aware of any case in which they have sold them.
@@soundsparkThis isn't true, you can speak honestly on a sponsor and can't be compelled to do otherwise. With that said, people usually avoid negative criticism as they can pull the sponsor or refuse to sponsor them again in the future.
Eric even discourages viewers from cracking windows, and shows off this piece of software made for it, when in reality you need only a powershell or batch script.
use massgrave
14:02 is massgrave with stolen cmd scripts with "NeW NaMe"
i thought the comments were being more heavily moderated than usual
Massgrave is a literal lifesaver lol
I pray at the massgravel church, other kms tools are eretic and unsafe
Amen 🙏
Honestly I’d call key resellers a similar level of sketchy as the fake activators just through different means.
If anything I'd say they're even worse
@@JoaoPedro-ki7ct Remember when Tiny Build said to pirate their games instead of buying from key resellers?
@@soundspark TinyBuild said that too? I can only remember Running With Scissors saying so (if I am not mistaken)
@@soundspark in what world is tinybuild even a little bit similar to windows? microsoft has OEM programs where they can generate infinite codes, games are vastly different.
@@ギコ Steam publishers have access to generate codes for free too, but if you sell a code then fraud gets reported not only do you have to give back the money but pay a penalty to process the chargeback.
It’s always the 2024 or 1234 password ones 😭😭😭
I bought an off-brand mini PC that came with Win 11 Pro, turns out it was an unlicensed copy and it came with a pre-installed activator. 🤨
It is unfortunately common. Hopefully at least they didn't use fake one.
@@EricParkerThey most likely did use some fake one (real kmspico was last updated in 2016 and MUCH better methods exist), for example HWID (illegitimate) windows activation method exists, which is basically just small server side vulnerability on Microsoft servers, that allows you to basically activate any PC (even remotely), if you have hardware ID of it, you cannot tell if the person used this or not, because ite the same as having legitimate license, it is even documented online and also open-source implementation of this exists. The github (yes its hosted on Microsoft's own service lol) repo with pretty good implementation of this has over 70K stars
just reinstall windows on it (or don't use windows)
Damn, it came with malware. The activator on the other hand is probably not great either
@@cool_bug_factsactivator is probably not but there is probably other malware
lesson number one: if you see glossy icons in exe files in 2024 that means its a trojan
I mean, after the 2nd ad redirect I would have already given up on that site
Which site you give up? Ad one?
@@lillieainston9358 the first one at 2:03 :d
the 2nd time it opened a new tab for an ad, I would have closed the whole browser
It was funny how he was clicking the "close" button and it was just opening another pop-up or tab.
"what are you doing"
"FULL VERSION 2024"
"windows what the fuck"
"hey atleast im not Activate Windows"
whoa hello
Just use the massgravel script instead...
There's this thing called "microsoft activation scripts" I've used before that does the job without installing malware.
20:08: how to break CZcams's compression... (And good to finally be able to finish watching this...)
What breaks it even more is if you encode the output of /dev/urandom as a video. It's an excellent way to waste google's resources.
bro straight up destroyed youtube's compression 💀💀
The timestamps got changed after the sponsor got flagged by CZcams and edited out.
The new timestamp is 19:08
all the features of activators like this can be acheived with just a few commands in cmd. i beleive one to change the key server to some other one that isnt microsofts that always reports activation is successful, and then another to check for activation, and thats all. thats probably the safest way
yeah. Very very specific commands. What dumb comment
obligatory massgrave plug
What is the verdict on something like massgrave then? Not sure if that's been covered on this channel yet, but afaik, it's a completely free Windows and Office activator (according to its github) and I've seen people talk about it a lot.
Yea you can use this. And if you are scared afterwards just format C and reinstall windows. Since its a hwid activation, its still activated after a completely fresh install.
Massgrave is also open source and was actually found to be pretty good and legit. It even has a new HWID method now that the old one (pretend to upgrade from activated Windows 7 or 8.1 with no KMS) doesn't work anymore. The only risqué part of this is the tiny modification to gatherosstate.exe (and that's the only thing I haven't verified myself to not be malicious, but it's small enough that it can be confirmed to not be malicious).
It's the only activator I will ever recommend, at least until it gets killed off for some reason.
massgravel is safe
Massgrave is safe
massgrave is safe
MAS takes 5 seconds.
whenever i watch videos like this I get a weird feeling that I'll somehow get malware just by watching someone install this. Kinda like how when movies were first invented, people thought a train could actually fly through the screen and hit them.
You can literally activate Windows just with 2 cmd commands
What really gets me about modern malware is just how badly written and how BIG the executables are. Some time ago I was targeted by a spearphishing campaign and they tried to get me to run their malware executable. Which was javascript running in an electron app (!!). The attackers had hijacked the account of someone I had in my contact list, hence we were actually chatting. I had them wait while I examined the malware. In the end I scolded them for being so terrible at writing malware, at which point they disconnected ;)
Some malware is that big because AVs refuse to scan files above a certain file size for performance reasons.
Yeah adding 700 MB of 0s basically guarantees never getting virustotald.
same story for most cracks and so on. There are real, trustworthy ones and ones that pose as such.
complaining about windows activators and yet selling sketchy windows keys...
ngl its kinda funny seeing someone like eric be sponsored by a shady key site. cmon dude
And this is why I keep a backup of an actual working KMS crack.
massgrave
just use KMS_VL_ALL_AIO, there's source for it
There's no need for crack. KMS is official feature for businesses, so just get a KMS server.
This is the way
That installation screen is straight out of the early 2000s or late 90s. Wow.
There are accounts of microsoft employees instead of fixing the liscense key, they just remote into your PC and crack it for you.
I enjoyed the video up until the point I realized it was just one big advertisement for a sponsor that sells stolen or illegitimate keys. You can say their OEM keys all day, but it's still illegal to sell an OEM key without the computer.
Agreement with said company terminated.
To point out something. Many software checks for debug environments, but SPECIALLY cracks, because a crack is going to get invetsigated by the company and patched cracks are usually obfuscated and protected.
Microsoft Activation Scripts FTW!
I'm glad you covered this because it's one of those things I always wondered what they did. I've never downloaded one myself, but my pc came with one pre-installed.
When I was little, I used an activator to activate free windows, well now I self-host a reversed engineered windows kms server docker container, and activate my windows that way.
what
Good for you
Infinite iq solution.
i have a program that is real and has different methods of activating windows HWID,and more.
@@kingkayne7738everybody knows about massgravel mate
the executable that is named START_INSTALL is probably launching a tool from github and also doing malicious activity in the background and it also looks like its written in C# are you going to make a video about decompiling this? i bet its not even obfuscated
that's why i use kms scripts like MAS
"don't use activators !" proceeds to advertise a sketchy key reseller
eh ??
The most based way to activate windows is with using the Microsoft Activation Scripts project.
You don't support sketchy 3rd party sellers selling keys from unknown sources which could be revoked in the future for various reasons, causing you immediate issues.
Additional benefit is that you don't monetarily support Microsoft. Quality data is the new gold and they will farm it regardless you pay $139/$199 or not. Remember that different countries have different legislation surrounding this, so it's not even necessarily problematic for users.
There are actually "legit" reasons for such tools to block debugging, specifically to avoid reverse engineering from other hacking groups and original software developers
The original versions of these tools do not have any of these anti debugging checks, also there is fully open source and documented pretty popular activator on github (site owned by microsoft) lmfaoo
this is why linux is a great alternative to windows, since its free and you dont have to download sketchy apps just to change the wallpaper
You also don't need activation to fix the RGB override that's built into Windows now, which permanently turns my mouse lights off every time I connect it to Windows
You don't need to download anything to change wallpaper smh
@DjqisjDjqj1idjc-zu9eb You do on Windows if it's not activated, the personalization tab is greyed out
@@zerron2156 iirc you can just right click an image and press set as wallpaper
i love when a big block of text appears and youtubes compression completely shits itself even at 1080p
how do u have such patience for doing these shits, like, dude, just by looking at it, it gives me headaches 😭
never paid for windows and never will
i love the way this guy makes videos. keep up the good work!
get,activated,win
Anyone who uses those kinds of sites is a total newbie, real veterans use kms downloaded from github, and real windows masters know how to activate it only with cmd commands
Dont ever buy cheap keys as the are often by credit fraud or are keys that are not legal to be sold as they are. Just use public KMS servers that will happily activate if you are to dam cheap/poor to buy a legal copy for windows/Office
I like how these videos are simple, not many edits, intro screens, outro screens, just straight to the point
Man, I have a story with this one. I had a legit win 7 that I agreed with microsoft to update to win 10, but my hdd bricked on 2018 new years, so I have lost my win 10 license and my win 7 code didn't work for some reason to re-activate it. That is how I have found out about this software, got infected twice with garbage, then found an original on the third try. I still have it on my old pc, that is now an archive, as a relic of a past.
As far as I remember, it should be virus free, since I got it from the forum it was posted on, but I can still try to send it to you, though it is awkward booting up my now 12 year old notebook
video on windows "distros" when
nice soulless synths btw
@@cheeseball762 ty
what happened to manually changing the key server to one that is free? it takes about 2 commands in cmd.
nowadays there are simple methods that dont even require external programs to make your windows activated
viruses in the background is absolutely just playing among us and finding the imposter 💀
When the impostor is SUS!!1!
I saw SVHost venting!!
What you are using program to caputure network traffic (URL-s)
Really interesting breakdown since this is what "non tech savvy" peeps would download and that also makes me interested how bad de-bloaters for windows are since thats also a thing peeps are looking for to download. Also could you just add a couple files on the vm to see if anything happens to them?
I'd just assume an app named and looking like that is malware
You'll never win the weekly lottery with that mindset.
I noticed that a lot of cracks pull up porn sites. They get paid a fraction of a penny per click, and it just pulls up thousands of pages till the computer locks up.
IEG was one of the worst.
Once you got sent to their site you would not be able to get out
Pop-unders were variation of pop-ups - new window that poped under the browser window. One click-ad with pop-up, other-ok is still a pop-up.
PS: "Were" because they are statistical noise right now, as they work with browser quirks, so they aren't easy to develop and maintain by a typical spammer. One of the tricks is to attach handler to body and remove handler after first click, but that's just one of methods, not definition of pop-under.
why not use sordum defender control ?
it's really good, i use it on my VMs
it completely stops windows defender
I hate having to pay 150 dollars a year to use office
MS is just greedy
i was using KMS on windows before getting linux, and it was probably the most sketchiest thing i have ever done just to get rid of the stupid "Activate Windows" so that i can record videos normally
yes i do know that all programs that modify your file system is super sketchy, which is why i prefer switching to linux rather than using that thing on windows again. (if the windows 11 wasn't already bad enough, imagine having windows 11 with KMS...)
another reason these tools get detected is that often times they're pretty obfuscated, so instead of putting in the effort to reverse all that for no reason, av vendors just mark it as pup
The thing is that you can activate windows with like 7 lines in a BAT file
Here in less developed countries people buy a computer, and they usually barely know how to download Google Chrome (So don't even think of any other browser sadly), and people end up by going into a "technician" who can install some programs for them, but almost everyone, uses some unknown pirated programs for installing word and things like that, the problem is that almost every PC has these pirated programs and your security can get very complicated, because not even the owner of the pc might know from where that software came from. I've even seen people that sent their PCs for a quick formatting and even if that pc had a included windows home key, those people install windows pro and activate it with kms, not even cmd, making the situation even worse.
hi Eric! Cool video
mfw i see someone playing a game and the "activate windows" text is on the bottom right...
It's like the visual version of the smoke detector beep
14:20 Here you can use Resource Monitor instead since it will keep even processed that exited, so you can inspect what it was doing (read the program command arguments)
everyone in class used this to activate office, because college apparently was too cheap to provide us with licenses. sure enough their laptops updated forever among other wonky things, while i was chillin with libreoffice. good times. thanks for the upload:)
>Windows activators are scary, don't use them!
>Doesn't mention MAS.
>Posts that trying to download MAS is "very likely to get malware."
>Buy these shady volume license keys instead!
Nice video. Thought I had finally found another solid channel, way to 180 that take.
If you're going to claim to have abandoned the sponsorship, it doesn't sell very well when the sponsor is still literally mentioned in the video. Maybe my timing is just unlucky, either way, bad look. You should have just eaten the fact that you posted hood-certified Cringe and reuploaded without the sponsor.
Massgraval is trust worthy though its on the piracy megathread
another great apload as usual
I just hope one the Linux desktop gains more market share and we don’t have to worry about these anymore.
Imagine that world!
I used illegal Windows 7 activator a few years ago. Nothing bad happened and that computer ran Windows 7 until it's power supply gave up and I couldn't be bothered buying a new one. I guess looking at this video I got really lucky I didn't bork my entire PC.
Am I hallucinating or this video was uploaded then got taken down and it's back?
yes
It's back again
Probably an issue with the old title, not sure what it is but the big quotation marks around "Activator" makes me think he had a less algorithm friendly word there before
@@johndeaux8815 I agree witnh you
@@johndeaux8815 Nope. CZcams took it down automatically thinking I was promoting those tools.
at first I used the activator my dad used, then I decided to look for the original source and found it
I could just MAS, but I like the purpose-built software with all its included tools
Lucky I've bought a fresh windows activation when I build my first gaming pc!
What if i gonna do cmd activation with kms servers
One of the worst programs I ever had was the automotive DVDs that there was like 80 DVDs and it had the main program installed on the computer and it would tell you which DVD to put in depending on the vehicle you were looking up
I can't remember the name of it, but it talked to 8 different websites to verify itself constantly to make sure you paid for it.
It was a good program and I didn't have to get the Chilton manual out
I used to buy the books in the 80s for the vehicle. Chilton manuals were a big seller for DIY and for mechanics
The biggest thing that was in these books and in this software, was the wiring system and color codes and pin outs
Microsoft and Anti-malware companies are somewhat responsible for this by automatically flagging any activator as malware (based only on (y" signature), regardless if it is harmless or not. As a result some users will execute those with A/V disabled and this give full freedom for malicious people to put crap into it. In the end it does not really matter, you should stay away from those activators and instead buy a proper key OR (if you can't afford it) use a script that you can read yourself and trust.
what about massgrave and massgravel on github though? i've heard good things about those projects, despite how sketchy they look.
massgrave is legit, i havent had any issues with them.
You can do it manually without running any scripts
@@VeryCuul you run the script yourself when doing "manually".
@@khlua4590 you can do the things the script does yourself.
They are safe
Another good way to get keys is the curb!
I found a bunch of windows 7 keys from old dumpster PCs and whenever i find them I just take a picture of the key and leave the PC It worked on my win10 install and win11 on my steam deck.
Windows 7/8/8.1 keys no longer work on Windows 10/11 since September 2023
how do i activate linux?
I suggest you use Ratiborus's KMSAuto
The big three letter organizations would purchase absurdly costly things. For espionage.
During Windows XP and 7 days I used the same two activators for YEARS and didn't get hacked. Either that or I did but they didn't find anything worthwhile to steal so they left.
I switched to Linux since, but I still have the KMSPico XP one in my torrent client with 200+ share ratio and counting xD
theres a script on github that can activate everything and its just so useful, and of course secure, it does hwid activation
ye
MY BOY GOT A SPONSOR, LETS GO ERIC
The question is what's the point of doing so when the only malus of not activating is an easily removable watermark
What am I doing with my life installing these things? Living on the edge what else would I be doing
Legit the only time I've gotten a virus was from a fake activator I installed on Windows 7 that started filling my computer with random programs. At least it was a fresh install...
12:25 isn’t it chilled windows icon? 😂
Sad to see we use this as work on a regular basis. I guess they're gonna see the consequences some day.
I have an exe that pops up as a rat that i got from someone claiming they were cheats for a game (i acted clueless to get it so i could look at it), its a bit old but was wondering if maybe you wanted to look at it
linux users: What???? You need to pay in order to use an operating system?
9:05 There IS a reason for it to check for debugging, to prevent what are called "crack freeloaders" where other individuals reverse engineer your crack and make their own program using your techniques they reversed and release it
You can use Windows unactivated... unless it's pre-Windows 8
You can also use windows 7 unactivated perfectly fine. Pre-Windows 7 is where you can barely use your computer if you hadn't activated windows.
@@AquaCobalt I couldn't get Windows 7 to work at all unactivated, it would just log me right out
@@TylerFurrison maybe you were using a really old version of windows 7? I know Windows Vista logs you out, but not 7, because I've used 7 unactivated and all it does is change your wallpaper back to black.
@@TylerFurrison I did some research and I couldnt find anything related to windows 7 logging out if unactivated. The worst it would do was pester you with activation reminders and stop giving you updates. The only reason windows 7 would log you out would be power plans...
@@AquaCobalt Huh, maybe I'm misremembering then? I could be conflating Vista and 7's activation stuff, because Vista DID log you out.
That's why the git hub ones are better
The only way to get "free" windows licence is to get a key online, I used to do that on my old laptops