Are Those $40 Deals for Microsoft Office 2021 Lifetime License are Legit?

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While browsing through the internet, you may have noticed some pitch of low-priced Microsoft Office 2021 license keys that comes to around $40-$50 for a lifetime validation. That’s a bit strange when the official pricing of Microsoft Office 2021 is pretty high. Did you ever wonder why the price of these Office license keys is that low? Are you wondering about the legitimacy of low-priced product license keys? If so, we are here to find out the answers to your questions. Throughout this article, we will discuss the whole picture of low-priced product keys with their pros and cons. 

To avail of every feature and tool of Microsoft Office 2021 applications, you must activate the Office Suite with a license key. It will verify whether the software copy is genuine and get access to every advanced feature and tool.  There are three types of Microsoft licenses, Retail, OEM, and Subscription-based. Knowing the license specifications before purchasing an Office 2021 license is important.  

The Office 2021 retail license keys are acquired from local-online stores or the Microsoft license key store. With a Office 2021 key, you can transfer the product activation key to activate the same version of Office 2021 on another device by deactivating the key from the current device. The retail key comes with lifetime validation. 

OEM or Original Equipment Manufacturer licenses are the keys that come with the newly purchased devices. The device manufacturer puts on your device’s OEM copy of the software. You can avail of that Microsoft official license without purchasing the key. The major drawback of OEM keys is that you can only redeem these keys on a single device. Microsoft provides the OEM key to the device manufacturer through OEMSLP (OEM Source Licensing Program). Some online stores sell the OEM key, but Microsoft only authorizes some. Before purchasing the OEM license from them, you need to be aware. The Msckey is an authorized Microsoft dealer that provides OEM licenses. 

Subscription-based Office 2021 licenses are the license keys that come for a limited time with subscription renewal options. You must specify the license numbers while purchasing the license. Microsoft will permanently move to the subscription-based Office license in the near future. For this reason, the tech giant has already released Microsoft 365 as the potential successor of Office 2021. 

[Note: You must redeem the license keys on specific versions. Otherwise, you won’t be able to activate the software even when you have a genuine license key.]

Unofficial or unauthorized licenses can be a huge threat to your device system as well as your data and information. The unauthorized license can often be involved with software piracy that may contain security risks like malware, virus, spyware, ransomware, worm, and even APT. Sometimes you may become a victim of eavesdropping and software counterfeiting. On top of that, it may result in a degradation of quality. However, you won’t be able to install updates provided by Microsoft and get official support with software that is activated with an unauthorized license key. So, using the genuine or authorized license key to activate the software is always recommended for your safety and support. 

You may have noticed that some Office 2021 license keys come at a fraction of the actual price. The seller of these cheap Office license keys claims to provide a lifetime validation with the purchase. Most of them come fraudulently or illegally. The malicious attackers and hackers plant some of them to facilitate themselves.

The low-priced Office license key can be acquired in many ways, most of which are illegal. The ex-employees of Microsoft are a source of these product keys. MSDN or Microsoft Developer Network is another way to get Microsoft license keys at a wholesale price. Microsoft provides a huge number of

license keys to the subscriber of MSDN with a condition to not share them with others, and you know the rest. 

Though the seller claims that the low-priced license key comes with a lifetime validation, in most cases, it doesn’t last for a year. In fact, you may lose your activation right after activating the software with an unauthorized license. The keys claimed through MSDN are a little different; they last till the MSDN subscription ends. 

Some facts make the lifetime Office license keys come at a low price. One of them is that they come fraudulently and illegally and sometimes from the black market. To provide you with the license keys at a rate of $40, the seller must claim the license key for less than that price, and this is where comes the black market or fraudulent methods. 

Another source of these low-cost license keys is MSDN, a subscription-based network combining Microsoft developers. Microsoft officially provides a bunch of product keys to MSDN subscribers with some terms and conditions. But some subscribers leak these product keys regardless of these terms and conditions at a low cost. 

Of course, these sources can provide you with the Office license key at a low price; but some purchases can come with a high potential risk. Some cheap license key providers can save your payment information and use them to facilitate themselves. Moreover, these keys can compromise your device system to malicious actors and others. 

There are some limitations applicable to the low-priced license keys. One of them is getting official support from Microsoft. With a low-priced product license key, you won’t be able to get Microsoft Official support. In some cases, the software cannot be upgraded with the recent updates. On a wide view, you’ll notice a difference in quality while using the software. 

There are many alternatives to Office lifetime license keys. The subscription-based licensing (Office 365, Microsoft 365) could be a great alternative to low-priced license keys. You can avail of them with a low-cost periodic subscription fee. The main backdrop of subscription-based options is that it doesn’t come with lifetime validation. 

Another alternative to Office lifetime licenses could be Google Workspaces and LibreOffice, which comes free with some limited tools and features. This can help you to get your job done, but not on the advanced level of task-completing. For example, Google Workspaces doesn’t have a wide range of tools and features like Microsoft Office 2021. 

The answer is ‘Yes’; you can still purchase the low-cost Office license keys with lifetime validation. But you need to be aware while purchasing them from a license key store. Otherwise, you can get scammed or end up facing the potential risks. There are some trustworthy sources to get your low-cost Office 2021 lifetime licenses, and from these sources, you can grab the license key without worrying much. The trustworthy sources are given below; 

We have touched the finishing lines of this discussion. Always remember to be aware while purchasing a low-cost product activation or license keys from an online store. It is recommended to purchase the key from an authentic and trustworthy source. We are all up for today, have a great day.

Microsoft to update Office Pro Plus after Dutch ministry questions privacy

Microsoft plans to update its Office Pro Plus products by the end of April to address a series of privacy concerns raised in an audit commissioned by the Dutch justice ministry that flagged what the auditors called "high risks" to government users' privacy.

The update for many of the company's Office Pro Plus customers, which has been confirmed by Microsoft, will address concerns relating to a package of popular Microsoft programs — namely that they were sending diagnostic data from Europe to the United States without adequate documentation and user controls over what was sent.

Microsoft and the Dutch justice ministry agreed on the changes as part of an "improvement plan" with an April deadline. A ministry spokesman told POLITICO that if Microsoft's responses proved "unsatisfactory," the ministry could raise the concerns with European data protection authorities for further action that could include "enforcement measures."

In a statement, Microsoft's top privacy and regulatory counsel, Julie Brill, underscored that the Dutch ministry had commissioned the audit as a customer of Microsoft and had not sought regulatory action against the company.

“The ministry commissioned the report in its capacity as a customer to clarify how our services are run and we’re working with the ministry’s staff to share additional information and help resolve its questions as we would for all enterprise customers,” Brill said.

She added that the issues raised in the report, conducted by the Privacy Company, a Hague-based consultancy, relate to “diagnostic data in one product,” Office Pro Plus, and that the company is “confident this is consistent with Dutch law and GDPR,” Europe’s General Data Protection Regulation privacy law. Office Pro Plus includes a range of Microsoft programs.

“We feel good about what we’re doing to give customers transparency and choice on the diagnostic data they share with us, but we always want to do more,” Brill said. “In the coming weeks we will take additional steps to make it easier for customers to understand what data needs to go to Microsoft to run our services and why, and where data-sharing is optional.”

When Microsoft updates products, the update usually takes place worldwide for users of the product and the company gave no indication that would be different in this case.

Under the EU's data protection laws, the Irish Data Protection Commission is the “lead supervisory authority” in charge of making sure Microsoft complies with the rules. If the Netherlands chose to escalate its concerns, it could forward a request on the relevant issues to the Irish regulator. Meanwhile, any issues would be closely monitored by the European Data Protection Board, which gathers all EU data regulators, and the European Data Protection Supervisor, which may in turn start their own investigations that could lead to enforcement action.

A spokesperson for the Irish Data Protection Commission said it is “aware of this matter and its significance to companies using the Microsoft product in question. On becoming aware, the DPC immediately engaged with Microsoft seeking further information on the processing of telemetry data, in response to which Microsoft is providing detailed responses.”

The Privacy Company, a consulting firm that the ministry contracted to do the audit, said in a blog summary of the findings that “Microsoft systematically collects data on a large scale about the individual use of Word, Excel, PowerPoint and Outlook.”

It added: “Covertly, without informing people ... Microsoft does not offer any choice with regard to the amount of data, or possibility to switch off the collection, or ability to see what data are collected, because the data stream is encoded.” A major concern of the Dutch was that the company sends the data back to its servers in the U.S.

Microsoft doesn't agree with some of the assertions of the Privacy Company's report but is making changes to its products as it routinely does to accommodate customers. The company has previously disclosed to customers its use of diagnostic data.

The new focus on privacy comes as different components of Microsoft, one of the world's most valuable companies, have recently faced scrutiny for a variety of privacy concerns, especially LinkedIn, which Microsoft bought in late 2016 for $26 billion.

Nicole Leverich, a spokesperson for LinkedIn, said “member data is never shared with customers on an individually identifiable level, only in aggregate for ad sales.” Last November, Ireland’s Data Protection Commission found that LinkedIn used the email addresses of around 18 million non-LinkedIn members to target individuals with ads on Facebook all in an effort to grow its customer base.

The regulators noted that LinkedIn’s actions violated its protection standards, although the dispute was amicably resolved.

Leverich said the company “fully cooperated with the DPC’s 2017 investigation of a complaint about a European advertising campaign and found the global processes and procedures we had in place were not followed. We took appropriate action and have made the internal changes to help protect against this happening again.” In Brazil last year, federal prosecutors said Microsoft had violated local laws with its collection of Windows 10 users’ data without getting proper consent. In 2016, France ordered Microsoft to cut back its collection of user data and to halt tracking of the web browsing habits of Windows 10 users without getting permission.

Despite these privacy dustups, Brill touted the recent steps Microsoft has made to improve users’ privacy, including “new features in the Windows setup process, enhanced options for error data reporting in Xbox, a feature called Lockbox for Azure, and updates to our Privacy Dashboard including new tools for parents to manage their children’s settings,” she said.

Microsoft has been the subject of a number of complaints to the Irish Data Protection Commission, according to a commission spokesman, but none were serious enough to warrant a statutory investigation, and of the 16 open investigations into multinational tech companies, none are related to Microsoft. There have been 3,500 complaints to the commission in total.

Unlike other tech companies, like Facebook, that have drawn fire for privacy issues and problems spreading fake news, Microsoft has set itself up as a paragon of good behaviour, welcoming scrutiny into the company and the broader tech industry. Company leadership routinely highlights its proactive investments in privacy. Last year, the U.S. Supreme Court heard arguments after Microsoft challenged an American search warrant for a customer email that resided in Microsoft's servers in Ireland, and last May, the company announced it was extending the privacy rights that are at the core of GDPR to its worldwide consumer customer base.

“Having the scrutiny is actually good, I think,” CEO Satya Nadella told the Washington Post last October. He urged the tech sector to improve its behavior. “Anyone who is providing a very critical service needs to raise the standards of the safety of that technology and the security of that technology.”

The huge problems affecting Facebook have touched other companies as well, including Microsoft. The New York Times reported in December that Facebook gave Bing, Microsoft’s search engine, the ability to view the names of almost all Facebook users’ friends without permission and also had data-sharing arrangements with companies including Netflix, Spotify, Amazon and Yahoo.

“Bing did not maintain profiles based on Facebook data for advertising or personalization purposes, and we took significant engineering steps beyond what Facebook required to ensure this could not happen,” said Brill.

“We ended our contract with Facebook in February 2016 and data stopped appearing in search results.”

Microsoft says it's working on new AI features for Bing to let users search with images instead of text, and turn questions into graphs

Microsoft is introducing new AI features to Bing.Microsoft

A swathe of new AI features are coming to Microsoft's Bing, including the ability to search visually with images instead of just text, and the tech giant is removing its waitlist so anybody can try out the AI tool, it said Thursday.

The new Bing — introduced in February in the wake of the success of OpenAI's ChatGPT — is getting a range of updates including the ability to make restaurant reservations, search movies, save chat history, and move from text-only search and chat to image-based search and results.

This means users will be able to carry out visual searches in the chat by uploading images and searching the web for content related to the images. Other visual updates will offer image-based answers like charts and graphs and the option to receive an answer in different formats.

This follows from Microsoft's integration of Bing Image Creator with Bing Chat, which lets users generate written and visual content in one place. It has now been updated so that Image Creator will be accessible in over 100 languages.

The announcement, authored by Microsoft's corporate vice president and consumer chief marketing officer Yusuf Mehdi, gave no concrete timeline for when the features will be rolled out, but Medhi told Bloomberg that the visual search feature will become available in the coming months, while updates like receiving answers through charts and graphs are coming sooner.

The delay is so that Microsoft's Responsible AI team can work to ensure user safety, Mehdi told Bloomberg.

"There's a lot of work to review technology and plans against," Mehdi told Bloomberg."Is it harmful? Is it transparent? Is it inclusive? Does it not have bias? We're going to do the same thing on the images, and adding multimodal adds another degree of complexity."

Story continues

Bing — which functions using large language models like OpenAI's GPT4 — exceeded 100 million daily active users just a month after its AI update.

An early issue with the AI tool was that it produced strange and often disturbing answers including calling users delusional and even saying it wants to be human with emotions and dreams.

Those issues have since been resolved with Microsoft restricting how long users can speak with the chatbot.

Microsoft did not immediately respond to Insider's request for further comment about the new updates.

Read the original article on Business Insider