CID LIBRARY/ Computer ID
Description
CID aka Computer ID is a small, but extremely useful project. Module CID.dll is true dll library (no com or dll envelope but true native code ). Module provides interface for reding hardware ID without admin rights for Windows™ systems. This dll is useful for software developers who need a quick and reliable way how to generate unique ID e.g. for licensing from hardware serials numbers.
Demo displays just HDD based ID , full version offers MAC ID and detection of virtualized environment as well. Demo projects are available for C# , VB.NET and VB6 at the moment - you can download it from download section of this website.
CID library - FAQ
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Is there available key management support, utilities etc. ? No, CID library provides core functions for creating ID from HDD and MAC plus it can help determine if program run within virtaulized environemnt. If you are interested we can provide you guiudelines how to design such system and advice you few trick how to make it harder to break but remember that no kind of protection is absolute. For VB6 and VBA we can provide you links to free implementations of such functions like MD5 or SHA1 which are not available by default.Can I use CID for my Excel™ macros? Yes, of course - with conjunction with password protected macros you can enable certain functions just for certain computer(s).Can you guarant that CID library will work enywhere and forever? No, we can&t and with regard to the fact that Microsoft® Windows™ versions have been proprietary system hardly ever can. You can try demo version and if you are satisfied you can use full version.How much does CID library cost? At the moment is price $25, or € equivalent;HDD-MAC-Virtual-SHA... what??? HDD is Hard Disk Drive. Hard disk drives have - like many other things - serial number. This number can be read and processed into unique signature. CID library doesn&t return HDD number directly but a single 32bit integer number computed from all serial numbers found.
MAC is Medium Access Control ID and is world-wide unique number of your network adapter. This number is less reliable than HDD based ID and can be forged much easier way.
Virtualized environment - well, some programs like Microsoft® Virtual PC or WMWARE run operating system within operating system. It is kind of emulation which let you use many operating system simultaneously and a great way how to deal with software incompatibilities, viruses, intruders, spyware, trojans, adware etc. With no physical hardware there is pretty easy run a program simultaneously and violate license agreement so we decided to add detection of virtualized environment for Virtual PC and WMWARE.
SHA1 - secure hash algorithm and MD5 hash algorithm are industry standard for computing hashes. Hash is roughly said a key computed from data, which can not be easily reversed back into original data. For example text MD5("CID LIBRARY") = "38d8068bece23b1c3621995ff0dce6cd" and SHA1 ("CID LIBRARY") is "bb310c3d7a1b981826bb0cfdf7e4e6d4686b84c0". The only simple (and slow!!!) way how to break it is to try any combinatins until is hash matched, but it can take ages if is pattern long and properly formed. MD5 is obsolete, because it was broken by German cryptoanalyst prof. Hans Dobertin in later 90ties, but it is still hard to deal with for an average amateur cracker.Is virtualization detection absolute? No, it changes from time to time. We are trying to keep updates if we found that detection doesn't longer work for new products, but we can't guarant that it will be possible nor update time.