By Jimmy Rogers
Contributing Writer, [GAS]

Mary-Jo Foley has posted an interesting bit of news about Microsoft’s most popular OS.  Nope, not Vista, silly, Windows XP.  It seems that Microsoft is planning a roll-out of a new version of Windows Genuine Advantage for XP.  If the update thinks you’ve got a pirated version of XP, The background will become all black with a transparent “non-genuine” warning over it (similar to the one below).

According to Microsoft, this update will allow them to track stolen software keys more easily but will not include any “counter-measures” like the unpopular “kill switch” that initially shipped with Windows Vista (and was later replaced in SP1).  Also, this update will only affect XP Professional, as it is the most popular version for pirates.  I assume this is because most people savvy enough to pirate Windows would rather jump off a cliff than use XP Home Edition.

While Microsoft claims that Windows XP users actually want this new nagware added to their OS, I find it a little hard to believe. The wording of their user survey must indeed be very misleading for users to accept installing this on their machine.  I’ll bet it asks if users would value “being notified if [they] are a victim of software piracy.”  In reality, people who pirate Windows are unlikely to install Windows Genuine Advantage on their computer in the first place.

[Image via ZDNet]