Performing a licence audit

[freedomit]

An ad-hoc customer who we do a little consultancy for now and again has called to say they want us to perform a licensing audit on there systems. The current IT guy is a friend of the boss and has apparently being transferring OEM licenses and possibly used his own license for the on-premise Server/Exchange.

My question is how would you go about auditing licenses in an environment your almost blind to? I can sit in front of each computer with an activated copy of Windows and Office but what makes them licensed? For Servers I can check the number of users on the Server and ask to see the Server and Exchange CALS but what about the key its activated with? Just looking for any tips or advice before i go?

 

[Markverhyden]

https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/solutionaccelerators/ff807352.aspx

 

[freedomit]

https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/solutionaccelerators/ff807352.aspx

Thanks thats really helpful for the Server side of things.

Just wondering about the desktops, for instance how do i know if a installed copy of office was OEM and has been transferred from another computer?

 

[TurricanII]

I would total up the number of copies deployed and compare with invoices showing number of oem copies bought.

Then dump the keys with nirsoft tool which i think shows 'modification' date. look for duplicates and search Google for the serials to see if they pop up on wares sites.

 

[freedomit]

I would total up the number of copies deployed and compare with invoices showing number of oem copies bought.

Then dump the keys with nirsoft tool which i think shows 'modification' date. look for duplicates and search Google for the serials to see if they pop up on wares sites.

Good idea, I guess also I can look at age of PC, if it's a brand new 6th gen i3 running OEM Office2007 it's probably been transferred over.

 

[TurricanII]

If MS conducted a SAM audit they would look for dodgy and duplicate keys, and may want to see proof of purchase and or keycards. I wouldn't bother trying to work out if any oem key had moved. Product activation takes care of that.

 

[Markverhyden]

On the sidebar they have links to other stuff, like Office and workstation OS's. But I'm not sure what those reports contain. I seem to remember Magic Jelly Bean got that info but with the new licensing methods for Office and Windoze you won't get much. So a lot depends on what they are actually using. MJB has a paid version but I've never used it.

There is also this tool, but it was retired in 2011 - https://www.microsoft.com/en-mt/sam/msia.aspx

 

[jzukerman]

The client should have invoices and license paperwork. Note any OEM licenses. If there's no paper trail, it probably isn't legal.

 

[freedomit]

Just wanted to feedback, thanks everyone for advice. I ended up running Produkey and Speccy on all the computers as well as physically checking each computer for license stickers, not the quickest way to audit 30 computers but it worked.

So the results were, only 2 of the 7 servers were licensed (the current IT guy has been spinning up a new VM for every different application!!!), the only server CALS are for Server 2003 but servers are 2008R2 & 2012. Exchange 2010 not licensed and no CALS and of the 24 computers with Office 2010 only 8 licenses exists the reset were duplicates. Throw in a couple of Win7 Ultimate edition and Project Professional licenses and the total to get them legal is around £14k in licenses alone!!!

I'm going to sit down with them next week and suggest migration to Office365 and reduce the Servers down to 1p+2v.

 

[YeOldeStonecat]

Many RMMs include some license inventory/audit tools, where you can pull reports about various software, get a list of it, on what rigs, what product, what license key, how many times a particular key is installed, and it often gives the license type. Saves time from going to each computer. I just drilled into 1x client in N-Able and pulled that report in about 30 seconds.

From that...you compare keys, and ponder things. If it's OEM or retail...you know where to look for proof. If it's volume license, you also know where to look (and we try to keep many of our clients on volume licensing so that keeps things easy).

 

[Vyper28]

I had the pleasure of one of these for a client a few years back (not an MS audit, and audit requested by management). The added bit to this, was they were preparing a lawsuit against their ex-IT provider after a very nasty falling out.

I requested copies of all I.T. invoices for the past 3 years (tall order, but they dug them all up).
LUCKILY the provider had serial numbers on all the machines they had sold.

I did much the same as you, I went through every invoice and started a spreadsheet with "Machine Serial No." and a column for each "license sold".

Speccy/Belarc/Produkey on each machine and plop them into spreadsheet.

The best part was for software like Adobe Professional, the Ex-provider had sold them a license with each machine, but each KEY was actually in use 3 or 4 times. In one instance 3 machines were purchased at the same time, they paid 3x$400 for Adobe Professional, and each one had the same serial installed.

All-in-all It came out to about $6000 in licenses that were either missing completely, pirated, or double/triple billed for the same key on multiple machines.

For this client it was really 3 stages:
1.) Licenses you PAID FOR
2.) Licenses you HAVE
3.) Licenses you SHOULD HAVE

 

[YeOldeStonecat]

Speccy/Belarc/Produkey on each machine and plop them into spreadsheet.

I used Belarc once for a client many years ago, their "BelManage Auditor" product or something named like that. Was pretty pricey, back then (over 10 years ago) it was around 750 bucks.
A business had gotten fined by Adobe....and the manager wanted us to come audit their business and catch up their licensing.

FYI, the freebie Belarc Advisor is licensed only for free personal use, it's against their licensing to use it to scan business computers.
http://www.belarc.com/free_download.html#faq
"Q:Can I purchase a license to run the Belarc Advisor on my corporate network, or my customer's network?

A: We do not permit use of the Belarc Advisor for commercial purposes, however we suggest that you take a look at our products, which we do license for commercial use."

It would be a conflict to use Belarcs software illegally to perform a license compliance audit, right? I've seen it used by so many other techs for this....they use it to gather intel for themselves on business networks...and I always think/chuckle to myself about the whole conflict right there.

A lot of techs whine about the costs of RMM tools, when they support business networks. Yet...here's another reason to use a good RMM...you can legally (because that's part of the services you pay for with an RMM) use it to check license compliance.

 

[freedomit]

We use MaxFocus for RMM but this is an ad-hoc client so we have nothing installed on the network

 

[YeOldeStonecat]

We use MaxFocus for RMM but this is an ad-hoc client so we have nothing installed on the network

This makes it even easier....and can be done via the comfort of your couch or office after a quick phone call to the client.

Get remote admin creds for their server, either onsite, or remotely (I'd choose remotely), install probe. Deploy agents to workstations from there, let it cook overnight or two.
After a day or two of letting it inventory, pull a report from your dashboard. Once done, satisfied with gathered information, log into dashboard and select a site wide uninstall.

You already have the tool set, just spend a tiny bit of remote time and utilize the power of the tool set you have.

 

[fencepost]

You already have the tool set, just spend a tiny bit of remote time and utilize the power of the tool set you have.

And in addition you can point out any other issues that turn up during this, such as systems with old versions of Flash, Java, etc. and possibly turn it into a managed services client

 

[Vyper28]

I used Belarc once for a client many years ago, their "BelManage Auditor" product or something named like that. Was pretty pricey, back then (over 10 years ago) it was around 750 bucks.
A business had gotten fined by Adobe....and the manager wanted us to come audit their business and catch up their licensing.

FYI, the freebie Belarc Advisor is licensed only for free personal use, it's against their licensing to use it to scan business computers.
http://www.belarc.com/free_download.html#faq
"Q:Can I purchase a license to run the Belarc Advisor on my corporate network, or my customer's network?

A: We do not permit use of the Belarc Advisor for commercial purposes, however we suggest that you take a look at our products, which we do license for commercial use."

It would be a conflict to use Belarcs software illegally to perform a license compliance audit, right? I've seen it used by so many other techs for this....they use it to gather intel for themselves on business networks...and I always think/chuckle to myself about the whole conflict right there.

A lot of techs whine about the costs of RMM tools, when they support business networks. Yet...here's another reason to use a good RMM...you can legally (because that's part of the services you pay for with an RMM) use it to check license compliance.

We used the paid version of Belarc, but I was just a tech back then so I'm not sure what they paid for it.

 

[YeOldeStonecat]

We used the paid version of Belarc, but I was just a tech back then so I'm not sure what they paid for it.

Can't remember 15-ish years ago when I got it, think around 600 back then.

 

[YeOldeStonecat]

And in addition you can point out any other issues that turn up during this, such as systems with old versions of Flash, Java, etc. and possibly turn it into a managed services client

There's someone else with their thinking cap on!