Adding this to the menu couldn’t be simpler – there’s only a single registry key to add.

Open up regedit.exe through the start menu search box, and then find the following registry key:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Advanced

In the right-hand pane, create a new 32-bit DWORD value called EncryptionContextMenu and give it a value of 1.

Now when you right-click on a file, you’ll see a new option called Encrypt.

When you choose this option, you’ll receive the following dialog, asking if you want to encrypt just the file, or also the parent folder. You can also choose just the file as the default.

Once the files are encrypted, you’ll notice that the title of the file is now green, indicating that it’s been encrypted. The right-click option will also now change to Decrypt. 

Definitely much simpler… makes me wonder why this wasn’t a built-in option.

Download AddEncryptionMenu.zip Registry Hack

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Right-click on a file:

And up pops a nice dialog that you can use to easily drop a file into the right directory.

Install

Just download, unzip, and double-click on the registry files. You can choose to use the copy to, move to, or both.

Download Copy To / Move To Registry Tweak 

There’s a registry hack for Windows that will let you add a Copy To Folder or Move To Folder to the right-click menu, which can be very useful when you want to move a file but don’t have the other folder open already.

Right-click on a file:

And up pops a nice dialog that you can use to easily drop a file into the right directory.

Install

Just download, unzip, and double-click on the registry files. You can choose to use the copy to, move to, or both.

Download Copy To / Move To Registry Tweak

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A spokesperson for Microsoft was on hand to provide an official reaction:

"Microsoft is investigating solutions for the final release of Windows Vista to help protect against the attacks demonstrated. In addition, we are working with our hardware partners to investigate ways to help prevent the virtualization attack used by the Blue Pill."

Rutkowska was quick to quell suggestion that Vista was fully compromised however:

"The fact that this mechanism was bypassed does not mean that Vista is completely insecure. It’s just not as secure as advertised. It’s very difficult to implement a 100 percent-efficient kernel protection."

There has also been the suggestion that the hacker was sponsored by Intel to perform the work. Everything was developed whilst using AMD technology however she insisted that this was not the case.

Microsoft is coming away from this with a positive outlook. It remains to be seen whether other hackers will be optimistic now that it is clear that Vista can be hacked or whether Microsoft will be able to patch up all the vulnerabilities exposed at this meeting.

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Microsoft has consistently received criticism at the lack of resources they put into protecting their products. This attempt is aimed to rectify all that; people like Jon Callas, chief technology officer at PGP Corp, describing the stunt like this:

"They’re going directly to the bear in the bear’s lair. They are going to people who don’t like them, say nasty things and have the incentive to find the things that are wrong."

The suggestion is circling that that those who don’t like Microsoft would thus ignore this invitation to help them. Or worse still, hackers invited to the event, may research all the most notable security vulnerabilities and wait until the product is fully released before subsequently releasing their own viruses and who knows what other nasties.

The conference surely is a representation of how confident Microsoft is about their new product with Mike Janosko, a security expert from Ernst & Young, describing the event as a “bold statement”. Perhaps Microsoft believes that the latest operating system will prove too difficult for the hacker to exploit. At least the Blackhat Project is full of mostly respectable people.

We’ll let you know whether this event turns out to be a success for Microsoft or whether it turns out to be a bit of an embarrassment

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With some clever Registry trickery, hackers have found a way to permanently delay the activation of 32-bit Windows Vista.

A previous hack last month involved setting up a spoof key server to generate faked license keys for the corporate version of the OS. This hack, which is rather simpler, avoids running the key server entirely.

In fact, it doesn’t even require the input of any keys at all.

Vista runs, out of the box, fully functionally, for 30 days without requiring activation. This new hack stops the countdown timer at 30 days and makes sure that it never goes further – thus giving the eager pirate a fully functional version of Vista.

The hack, covered by Engadget, probably won’t work on 64-bit Vista, thanks to the security improvements MS has made in that version of the OS. You can also bet that Microsoft isn’t going to be sitting around with this exploit in the wild – expect the first batch of Vista Windows Updates to address this.

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 owe a deep-hearted "thank you" to Charlie over at The Inquirer right now, because this story is just not as interesting without his very bitter but realistic take on it.

Most of us remember the great effort Microsoft put in to developing a complicated and "foolproof" license setup for Windows Vista, and everyone has been waiting for its horrible defeat. Well, it looks like some crackers just got medieval on it.

Brute force cracking is as old as data security – if you have a hunch that someone uses a particular style of password, you can throw every password that fits those parameters at it in every combination until one of them is accepted. It’s long, it’s dirty, and it works on the Vista activation system.

The short keylength of 25 characters puts it well within the possibility of trying them all until one works. The only downside is, each legal copy of Vista is only able to be activated a certain number of times – so these codes that are accepted may easily end up activating units already on the shelves or even on someone’s computer. It would entirely be possible to take your new computer home, plug it in, and find out your OS is not authorised since other people have already activated it.

Charlie mentioned that he didn’t have a copy of Vista to test it on because of its anti-user measures, but the premise sounds pretty interesting and if it becomes widespread there could be some serious problems. What would Microsoft do if legitimate users are unable to register their legal software? I would not want to be an employee at the call centers (wherever they are) when this starts to get popular….

It all goes to show the old adage – "When you build a better mousetrap, you build a better mouse." Sometimes you just build an angry mouse, who takes a very big sledgehammer to your very delicate, Rube Goldberg-esque trap.

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