Looks like Microsoft isn't happy with third-party tools that replace and extend features of its very own Media Creation Tool. So it has silently made a change to servers that host Windows ISO files. The change now affects the popular Rufus tool, which can't now download Windows 8, Windows 10 and Windows 11.
If I understand the situation right, Microsoft now checks the referrer data to determine from where the download request comes, and blocks it if it doesn't come from https://www.microsoft.com/<language>/software-download/windows<version>.
Technically Rufus relies on the Fido script to get the download done. It has been updated to version 1.30 that informs the user that the download is now blocked by Microsoft.
The developer expects a long time before a solution comes into play and will make possible to download ISOs again. As of now, the feature is not available in Rufus.
Rufus is the most popular tool for making bootable medias. It turns the complicated process of making a USB stick with Windows into a few clicks. For users' convenience it could auto-download Windows 8, Windows 10, and Windows 11 from the Internet and write it to your removable drive. So, due to Microsoft's intention this is no longer a thing.
Update: The issue has been fixed in Fido 1.31. Thanks to our reader Carlos Cabral for the heads-up.
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They seem to have fixed the issue with this pull request: https://github.com/pbatard/Fido/pull/42
Yeah. the fix is here: https://github.com/pbatard/Fido/releases/tag/v1.31
I was habit downloading *every* ISO files of what Windows version to be installed.