The term orphaned license means the inability to check mobile licenses back into the central License Server using the Policy Administrator tool.

This is because of a conflict with the SilkMeter Check-Out/Check-In process (Policy Administrator) when the User Account Control (UAC) feature is enabled on the relevant Operating System.  With UAC is enabled, when trying to check the Mobile License back into SilkMeter, the following error is rendered:



To ensure there are no issues during the Check Out/In process within SilkMeter, disable the UAC features on your system temporarily to allow this via (START | CONTROL PANEL | USER ACCOUNTS | CHANGE USER ACCOUNT CONTROL SETTINGS) - Setting to Never Notify. 



Note, when a Mobile License does become Orphaned, there are various troubleshooting steps you can implement to resolve, How can I remove the Orphaned License from my client machine?

If these options do not assist, there is no option but to allow the Mobile License to expire.

You will also find a generic Knowledge Base Article here, 'How do I troubleshoot Mobile Licensing issues'

User Account Control (UAC) is a technology and security infrastructure introduced with Microsoft's Windows Vista and Windows Server 2008 Operating Systems, with more relaxed versions present in Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2.