Tread cautiously when entering any information online
Q: Is there is a post and an answer on how to remove the banner “Need to renew Microsoft Windows 10 License” that appears on the start-up for Windows 10?
— Ellis B., Niceville
A: At present, there is neither a post nor an answer that deals with that question, Ellis. Well, there wasn’t when I started writing this edition, but if you’re reading it, then obviously, that has changed, and there are now both a post and an answer. Funny how it just seems to work out that way.
Let me start by saying that I’ve never seen or even heard of the particular message that you cited. That’s not unusual — I can’t possibly know every single message that Windows chooses to pop up on you.
But what’s causing me to stop and wonder twice about this is that Windows 10 doesn’t require its license to be renewed. Also, Windows doesn’t tend to display such information in anything that I would call a “banner.” It would have helped immensely if you had included a screen capture of the error message.
With my extremely limited knowledge of your problem, I can only speculate. My first inclination is to suspect a malware infection. One might ask, “What does anyone have to gain from such a scam?” Well, if they can convince you that they’re actually Microsoft, they can trick you into giving up anything from your Windows login credentials to your credit card information.
All of this information is worth real cash money in the dark corners of the internet where such things are bought and sold. If it is indeed malware, your best bet is to find one or two quality malware scanners and let them do their thing on your PC.
The only thing that bothers me about this is that if it is malware, someone else somewhere should have some knowledge of it and should have posted remediation information online. I did a search for the message, exactly as you posted it, but didn’t find anything. Perhaps what you cited was the gist of the message, rather than the exact text? If so, my search is in vain anyway.
Another possibility is that your copy of Windows hasn’t been properly registered with Microsoft. Although there were, and are, many ways of obtaining Windows 10 itself for free, the product license…
