[GLLUG] MS's WGA servers fail

[Thomas Hruska]

Charles Ulrich wrote:
> On Sat, 2007-08-25 at 20:17 -0400, Thomas Hruska wrote:
>> Michael Rudas wrote:
>>> Wow!  Talk about a "single point of failure."  The problem seems to
>>> have been (mostly) fixed.  Still...
>>>
>>> "Microsoft WGA servers down; XP and Vista installs marked as counterfeit"
>>> <http://www.boingboing.net/2007/08/25/microsoft_wga_server.html>
>>>
>>> -- Mikey
>> Hmm...interesting.  I wonder if this is directly related to the problems 
>> Microsoft had/is having:
>>
>> http://cubicspot.blogspot.com/2007/08/windows-update-updating-without.html
>>
>> (Sequence of events:  Worldwide update occurs -> WGA servers barf -> 
>> User PCs disabled.  Awfully coincidental...)
> 
> It looks like Boing Boing updated the story with your info.

Yup.  Didn't think they would.  The connection between the two events is 
_speculative_ at the moment but there is a high probability that I'm 
right on the money (it is pretty suspicious how, hours after I document 
the update, users complain about WGA flagging them as counterfeit).  It 
would be nice to get confirmation from Microsoft...but then they would 
have to admit to:

1)  Pushing out an update that users couldn't choose to approve/deny.
2)  All the WGA servers going down as a result of that update.  And thus 
having a single point of failure.
3)  Poor programming of WGA that assumed the person was pirating Windows 
should it not be able to contact the WGA servers.

Somehow I don't see Microsoft handing that out on a silver platter.


On the plus side, I've had more people on my blog in the past couple 
days than there have been in, well, forever.  It is cool...in a 
geeky/nerdy sort of way.

-- 
Thomas Hruska
CubicleSoft President
Ph: 517-803-4197

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