Yes, for those coming from the Clarion world, it's true. WinDev does require a dongle (one for each product, WinDev, WebDev and WinDev Mobile).
Specifically, the IDE requires a USB dongle (older versions used a parallel port device). The programs you create for your users do not (unless you want them to, as Pete Halsted points out).
Dongles do create worries about the dongle getting lost or stolen or simply failing. PC Soft will replace failed dongles, although you have to provide some credit card info and return the failed dongle within a specified time period to avoid further charges.
In the Skype chat Rob Berry mentioned that he uses what he calls a USB spider, also known as a flexible hub. Here's a pic from one such product for sale on Amazon:
The flexible cords reduce the risk of the dongle getting damaged - if something does break it's more likely to be the hub's USB plug.
There's been a fair bit of discussion about the dongle requirement among Clarion devs considering WinDev. It all seems a bit retro, given that Clarion 1.0 was dongled but hit the market as sentiment was turning against dongles. And the conventional wisdom is that the dongle almost killed Clarion in its infancy. On the other hand, the dongle doesn't seem to have hurt WinDev.
Just don't lose it.