Just Sharing This MS Office 2016 Professional Plus - cheap?

[jeallen01]

As I mentioned in another thread, I found this page on Amazon appearing to offer the above as a download for £6.95 (Yes , Six Pounds and 95p!), and so I've been "experimenting" with getting that onto a spare W10 Pro laptop.

The process can be somewhat “suspicious” at times, but here is the story so far:

1st Attempt (Yesterday) - Failure

• After purchasing it on Amazon UK, it took about 5hrs for the seller to send me a link to the download site, which turns out to be https://setup.office.com, and a Product Key.
  
  
• When I logged onto that site I had to enter my name & email address and the Product Key and then start the “Download”
  
  
• However, when I tried to do the latter (twice), I got a screen with an error message with the error code 0x3000e, which does not (after some later investigation) does not appear to be a normal MS error code. The screen also gave me the UK 08003677920 number to call.
  
  
• When I did that, I was quizzed by “someone” who wanted to know how I had purchased the product, and how much I had paid!!
  
  
• He then handed me onto a guy on another team, where, in short, I had to allow him access to the PC in question via a Citrix remote access link
  
  
• That guy then looked at msconfig and showed me that ActiveX Installer was turned off (as was a lot of other stuff) – something I later found to be common to the other PCs here which all run Kaspersky Internet Security 2017. He then offered to fix the problem – an offer which I then politely declined, telling him that I would prefer to do my own investigations, and put the phone down!
  
  
• In the meantime I had switched off the 2 other PCs which were live on the network, and investigated the m/c onto which I was trying to installed Office.
  • Turned off the wireless connection
  • Ran a Kaspersky (which had been updated before I started all this) Scan and found nothing
  • Turned the wireless on again, and updated and ran MalwareBytes Free – again found nothing
    
  • Turned the wireless connection off again
• Updated and ran Kaspersky & Malwarebytes on the 2 m/cs I had switched off, and then on 2x machine which had not been switched on yesterday – again found nothing, so nothing appears to have "migrated" to them (thank goodness).

Later found out how to enable ActiveX installer on the target PC (either from Task Mgr, or IE11 Tools), and will now try again to down load the 2016 package – but, again with all other m/cs, phones and so on switched off, and then rerun Kaspersky & Malwarebytes on it before I turn anything else on.

Not sure where this is going, but I was kind of thinking that I will probably get the package installed, but with the risk of a secondary “package” of some sort of spyware – which I hope Kaspersky &/or MalwareBytes will pick up and which I will then need to eradicate.

2nd Attempt (Today) - Success (?)

Switched the laptop on this morning, and it took a long time to update, and finally came up as Win 10 Pro Version 1607 (Anniversary update).

Then followed the same process to start with (with all the other machines switched off!) , but it seemed to change very quickly and did actually work.

Found out that https://setup.office.com is the genuine MS Office download site – see this from answers.microsoft.com.

https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/msoffice/forum/msoffice_install-mso_win10/is-setupofficecomdownloadoffice-a-microsoft-site/5a4ed855-aaf2-4ad6-969f-194c1ab69cd9

• So went there, and had to log in to my Microsoft account (you need one to do all this), and, having got in there, was asked to enter the Product Key, and start the download of the Office installer
• Was able to save the installer where I wanted it, but when I fired that up, I had no option as to where it would install Office - I normally partition my drives into C:\ (OS), D:\ (Applications) & E:\ (Data) – and so I would normally install Office on D:\.
  
  (Will have to try to move it to D:\, which I should be able to do with Funduc from www.funduc.com as I managed that with Office 2010 on Win 7 Pro on another m/c).
  
  
• When that was complete, I fired up WORD 2016 and then had to go through the activation process – you appear to have the choice of the Microsoft a/c email address (which did not seem to work!) or the Product Key (which did).
  
  
• WORD 2016 starts up with a stupidly annoying Search Screen, but you can turn that off as explained here https://www.windowscentral.com/microsoft-office-basics-how-skip-start-screen-word-2016
  
  – same thing probably occurs in some of the other Office 2016 applications like PPT & EXCEL but have not been there yet.

After all that, I ran Malwarebytes and it came up clean, and now Kaspersky is scanning but – based on yesterday’s results – I don’t expect it to find anything. So, maybe, there's no secondary package of "nasty stuff"?

BTW: I checked the status of the ActiveX Installer, and it’s still disabled, so I really don’t understand the difference between what happened yesterday and today – can only speculate that it was something to do with the changes to the OS update with Version 1607 (???).

So, ATM, it does look like this is gen way to get OFFICE 2016 very cheaply if you want it and are prepared to jump through a few hoops - and with the possibilities of something going wrong

 

[Lazarus]

Think I'll stick with run of the mill Win 10 and various Linux distros!

 

[Topper]

Think I'll stick with run of the mill Win 10 and various Linux distros!

Likewise, headaches I have enough of

 

[Topper]

Think I'll stick with run of the mill Win 10 and various Linux distros!

Likewise, headaches I have enough of

 

[jeallen01]

PS: maybe should have mentioned that this could be of particular interest to anyone running Office 2007 (as does my wife's m/c) as MS have announced that support for that will discontinue in Oct 2017 .

 

[jeallen01]

Likewise, headaches I have enough of

Point taken, but at least the opportunity is there if you need it - and I've "suffered" the headaches already so you don't have to!

 

[blademedia]

• When I did that, I was quizzed by “someone” who wanted to know how I had purchased the product, and how much I had paid!!

• He then handed me onto a guy on another team, where, in short, I had to allow him access to the PC in question via a Citrix remote access link

So you've bought a suspicious copy of MSO and let a complete stranger take control of your pc , braver man than me .

 

[Lazarus]

PS: maybe should have mentioned that this could be of particular interest to anyone running Office 2007 (as does my wife's m/c) as MS have announced that support for that will discontinue in Oct 2017 .

Don't the cognoscenti all run Libre Office these days?

I certainly do.

 

[jeallen01]

So you've bought a suspicious copy of MSO and let a complete stranger take control of your pc , braver man than me .

I was/am using the otherwise rarely-used PC in question as the guinea pig for things like this because if it goes pear-shaped or gets infected then it is of little consequence - only when I am happy with what happens on that machine will I consider rolling s/w out to the other important machines. That's why I - albeit quite reluctantly - gave him access to that machine (having quickly switched the others off and pulling the network cables to the 2x NAS which are still not reconnected), and then declined to let him actually "fix" the download problem. Also I soon uninstalled the Citrix remote access client s/w!

Since then, I have done as much testing (except where I needed to update Malwarebytes, Kaspersky and then - albeit not intentionally - W10, and with all the other machines switched off) as possible with the LAN connection (wireless in this case) switched off so as to isolate it from everything else.

Don't the cognoscenti all run Libre Office these days?
I certainly do.

Well, I've tried and used Libre Office - and still have it on both the test m/c and my main PC, but, having, reluctantly over the years, got used to Office 2007/2010, I find it a bit "primitive" to go back to the Office 2000/2003-type interface of L O. Also, I still need to prepare presentations (for U3A stuff) and I found that "simpress", the L O presentations package, is very clunky compared with Powerpoint and kept moving stuff (especially illustrations) around to where I didn't want them; and the publishing program distorted images when I tried to insert them. So, not very useful to me then.

And then there is the fact that - courtesy of the corporate agreement that the company I then worked for -I paid all of £10 for the Office 2007 that is on the wife's m/c, and £20 inc backup disk for the Office 2010 that is on my main m/c. So another £20 to update 3x m/s to Office 2016 Pro Plus does not seem a bad deal (always assuming that nothing goes wrong from here)!

 

[Archive-8]

Dorset police gave a warning out the other day, about Citrix remote Access.

Although the message was about a bt telephone bill, they mentioned Citrix!

Remove it from the pc as soon as you can, according to the message it was to do with ransom ware.

 

[jeallen01]

Dorset police gave a warning out the other day, about Citrix remote Access.

Although the message was about a bt telephone bill, they mentioned Citrix!

Remove it from the pc as soon as you can, according to the message it was to do with ransom ware.

Thanks and see above as I did remove it yesterday because I was very suspicious of it anyway! So, if the download does not go properly, don't phone the "help line" that then gets you to allow remote access - that's what I meant about a possible secondary package of "nasty stuff"!

 

[Archive-8]

Seems Dorset Police might have the same problem:-

 

[jeallen01]

PS: Kaspersky just finished scanning the test m/c - nothing found - and I have now reconnected the 2x NAS to the network and can access the files on it from the main m/c. So looks like "no damage done" is confirmed.

 

[PaulR]

Still braver than me. I wouldn't let anyone take control of any of my computers regardless of the reason.

Does seem strange though.

 

[blademedia]

nothing found

That's what you might find next time you check your bank balance .

 

[jeallen01]

I think I may have identified the likely weak point in buying in the process of buying and using the Product Key, which is that the supplier's email with the Key includes the partial web address "setup.office.com" which you then have to put into the browser - but "most people", and that probably includes me earlier this week, would probably forget to look for the "https//" prefix, and thus get to something like "Office".

I suspect that going to that address immediately redirects the browser to the official MS "Office", but then logs, monitors and intercepts the next call from the PC to download the s/w, and then causes that to fail and send the PC to the Error Message site from where you are pointed to the Help Line from which "someone" asks for remote-access to the PC via the Citrix s/w - and that's then when the spyware/ransomware s/w gets downloaded to the PC.

BTW: I am now pretty sure that the comment from the "Helpline" guy about ActiveX installer not being working is a total red herring to get you to let him "fix it", because it is still disabled on that PC and yet the Office 2016 installation worked OK yesterday. Hopefully, because I "declined" that offer and immediately disconnected the PC from the network, and then later removed the Citrix remote access s/w, he was unable to actually install the dodgy s/w.

On that point, I have since updated and run both Malwarebytes and Kaspersky (including rootkit scans) several times, and nothing at all was found on any occasion - and the bank account (and the credit card account) are fine this morning.

OTOH, and I don't think this was at all related, yesterday morning that PC was updated to Win 10 Pro "Anniversary Update" (Version 1607) and it ran OK for a few hours, and then failed on multiple reboots to get to the login p/w screen - when I finally found out how to get the damned thing to go into Recovery mode I had to let the OS be rolled back to the previous version, and now it's working again. However, I did then have to reinstall Office 2016 (and several other pieces of s/w) and that went slowly, if somewhat laboriously, and it's now working again - and I ran Malwarebytes and Kaspersky again this morning, and they again came up clean. I think the failure was something to do with the Anniversary Update, but what that was I have not been able to identify.
BTW2: if you do get any sort of total lockout from W10 and want to try to get into Safe or Recovery Mode, the traditional F8 key on reboot does not work. However there is a lot of good advice here 7 ways to boot into Safe Mode in Windows 10 | Digital Citizen, and I used No 6 which involves interrupting the boot sequence 3 times and then on the 4th reboot it goes directly to the Recovery process.

 

[blademedia]

@jeallen01 if its something untowards you wont know nothing about it neither will you internet security, the first thing you will notice is money disappearing from your bank, as a precaution i would go into your bank and explain the situation, best safe than sorry.

 

[jeallen01]

@jeallen01 if its something untowards you wont know nothing about it neither will you internet security, the first thing you will notice is money disappearing from your bank, as a precaution i would go into your bank and explain the situation, best safe than sorry.

You may have a point about the bank etc., but not easy to visit them as it's an internet a/c and the nearest branch is 5+ miles away in Ealing - but I will alert them on-line. OTOH, nothing related to the bank a/c was involved in the s/w purchase - so I can't see how that a/c could be accessed by scammers, at least in this instance.

As for the credit card payment, that was through Amazon and hopefully that should OK, especially since all monthly payments to that card a/c are via specific payment instructions from me to the bank, and not via a DD by Amazon.

Therefore, whilst some concern is justifiable, I think the actual level of risk is very, very low

I think the actual risk is that, sometime in the future, that Product Key will be invalidated by MS as that happened to me a few years ago when the Key for W7 Pro was invalidated for a set of disks that I had bought several years prior to that (from a German supplier on Amazon), presumably because they were surplus "corporate stock" which should not have been sold on the open market.

 

[Archive-8]

Therefore, whilst some concern is justifiable, I think the actual level of risk is very, very low.

I would play it safe myself, and phone the bank.

It happens more than people care to admit!

 

[jeallen01]

I would play it safe myself, and phone the bank.

It happens more than people care to admit!

Just sent them a secure message from inside my on-line account - then it's on "electronic paper" that they have received, and the ability to phone that bank (Co-op SMILE) has effectively been stopped for the last few months anyway!

You may think this overall approach is somewhat "cavalier" but I am generally very careful, and - over many years - I think that there was only one occasion when I effectively got scammed, and that was about 6-7 years ago for some PC correction s/w that turned out to be totally useless.