Microsoft to honour $2 Windows 10 Pro key loophole sales

Microsoft has told users that it will honour sales of Windows 10 licence keys which exploited a loophole in the Windows Store, allowing users to buy the operating system for just $2.

Details of a bug in the Windows Store system began to spread on forums and social media in late June, with users reporting that creating an ISO image from the Windows 10 preview installation file then leaving the product key section blank during installation could in some circumstances cause the Store to offer a licence for just $2. At the time, the ultra-low-cost licence appeared to work fine, but there were concerns that the licences would not be valid for the retail release of the software on the 29th of July.

Now, Chinese website ITHome has published a report, spotted and translated by Neowin, has reported that users are being told that they will be able to active their licences regardless of their expenditure - good news for those who were able to take advantage of the bug in the system.

Although some users have reported that their low-cost keys have not automatically activated, those who have contacted Microsoft have been told that their keys are entirely valid and should activate fine over the next 30 days - the grace period allowed users who have either entered an invalid key or no key at all during installation - as the strain on Microsoft's authentication systems relax.