List of Windows 7 telemetry updates to avoid

Can you please post the source of this information? It's VERY scary!

 

Another uninstall list
https://gist.github.com/xvitaly/eafa75ed2cb79b3bd4e9#file-remove_crw-cmd
I hope it could help

 

http://www.ghacks.net/2015/08/28/microsoft-intensifies-data-collection-on-windows-7-and-8-systems/

this thread https://www.dslreports.com/forum/r3...m-Spying-On-You-36-DNS-Addresses-to-host-file specifically this post https://www.dslreports.com/forum/r30223473-

and this post https://www.dslreports.com/forum/r30254435-

also this post talks about MS hardcoding and bypassing hosts file http://www.forbes.com/sites/gordonk...ows-8/?utm_campaign=yahootix&partner=yahootix

 

Very helpful. Thank you very much.

 

My computer freezes of late after updating. I found this piece of information:
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/3092627

And in the link below among other things, I noticed that the "comment" at the bottom is indicating KB3076895 is giving up IP addresses also.
http://www.infoworld.com/article/29...atch-ms15-084-kb-3076895-breaks-programs.html
I uninstalled KB3076895 and put on hold KB3092627 until I get more information.
Anybody knows more, any advice?

VS

 

I uninstalled KB3021917 (with the other recommended spy updates for W7 - and hid them). KB3021917 information tab indicates that it is a W7 performance update + telemetry.

After that, when I opened WU from CP it showed that WU was not checking for updates automatically - I had to manually check for updates. In fact it showed that I have never installed any updates. I opened installed updates and all my updates were accounted for.

As a test, I selected 'check for updates' and the only Important update that got resent was KB3021917. It came in at 305KB, so I decided to check it to see what would happen - it downloaded 11.5MB. I did not select any other updates (I had several optional updates). Maybe something else got triggered by this update that caused svchost to silently download more. Odd!!!

 

Is there a way to search for these updates to see if they have been installed, rather than trying to look for them individually through the list of installed updates?

 

See http://www.tenforums.com/windows-10...their-spying-features-windows-10-7-8-a-3.html,
post 22.

 

Geez, some of these "updates" are absolutely toxic! Years ago a user base would have grabbed their torches and pitchforks over something like this, and then MS would have repealed it shortly after. Now it's just accepted as an inevitability. so so sad

 

Yeah... it more or less makes using 7 too much of a hassle now if you have to obsess and wonder about each freakin' update that comes down the tubes... maybe that's their plan. Make is so much of a hassle to run the older OS's that people just throw up their hands and say "Ok, I'll go with 10"... Linux anyone?

 

Just stopped updating and trust in security. I know that's a bad way to think about it, but it's what XP users are doing.

 

But is 10 any better? I'd think that with each new version privacy would just erode more and more.

 

Well I do trust in the security of my XP boxes without patches, though I do still patch them anyhow via the POSReady tweak. But I got a new machine and to get the most out of the hardware I have there aren't XP drivers up to the task. I'm talking I couldn't even get a driver to make the wired LAN function adequately, let alone the graphics card/display to look nice. I have no choice in the matter.

If it turns out 8 or 10 are better in this regard I may have to upgrade. But I'd lay 10 to 1, blind, that that's not the case at all.

 

Yeah, believe it or not, I actually have in image here of Win 7 SP1, with zero updates, just turned it off completely. Lol.. I don't know whether it's secure or not, so I don't use it much, but it could be fine... easier to deal with for sure!

 

Yeah, if you choose to use 10, you just have to blindly accept and trust it, which many people can't or won't do. 10 would probably be worse, privacy-wise, than 7 or 8.1.

10 runs well on my machine here, and it's new and fairly clean, but when I run it, I have to accept the privacy situation as is. There is just no other way.

 

You "just have to trust it"? lol, omg what does that even mean? Like there are no descriptions at all and they're all just automatically stuck on you?

Trust isn't a place to start with M$.

 

It all boils down to trust. If you don't trust MS, you shouldn't use their OS, period. It's that simple. Do you use Windows and still distrust MS? If so, WHY??

 

Thanks, Robin. I've never done anything like this. So I just open a text file and paste

Close it. Type ".bat" on the file and then double click on it?

 

The updates have

Yes, open notepad, paste, make sure it says all files in drop down. in the description, make sure it's .bat at the end, then save.

 

If only... I use Windows 7 because for certain things there is no other viable choice. And many would-be "decisions" are forced upon us due to this lack of options, not just in the tech world.

Also when it comes to trust I work in degrees, not absolutes. Just the idea of the latter scares me stiff.

 

Thanks!

 

Haha. I know, it used to scare me too. Oh well. I can understand some folks are tied to Windows for gaming, or certain apps, etc. I fortunately am not. So I have images here of Win 7, Win 10, and a half dozen Linux distros also. In linux Debian serves me very well. If it weren't for superior hd video in Win on my machine, I'd probably be using Linux full time.

 

There are several ways to skin that cat. A quick and dirty batch script, around one line of importance:

Code:

@echo off
SetLocal
set OutputFile="%USERPROFILE%\Desktop\QuestionableUpdates.html"
set BatchFlag=
if "%1"=="-noclose" (
  set BatchFlag=/b
)
echo.
echo Searching for questionable updates, this may take a moment...
echo.
set ExitCode=0
wmic qfe where (HotFixID="KB2876229" OR HotFixID="KB2902907" OR HotFixID="KB2952664" OR HotFixID="KB2976978" OR HotFixID="KB2977759" OR HotFixID="KB2990214" OR HotFixID="KB3012973" OR HotFixID="KB3021917" OR HotFixID="KB3022345" OR HotFixID="KB3035583" OR HotFixID="KB3044374" OR HotFixID="KB3046480" OR HotFixID="KB3050265" OR HotFixID="KB3065987" OR HotFixID="KB3068708" OR HotFixID="KB3072318" OR HotFixID="KB3075249" OR HotFixID="KB3075851" OR HotFixID="KB3075853" OR HotFixID="KB3080149") list /format:htable > %OutputFile%
if not "%ERRORLEVEL%"=="0" (
  echo Error: WMIC failed, ErrorLevel %ERRORLEVEL%
  set ExitCode=1
  goto :error
)
echo.
echo Complete, opening results file...
start "" %OutputFile%
if not "%ERRORLEVEL%"=="0" (
    echo Error: Can't start/open html file, ErrorLevel %ERRORLEVEL%
    set ExitCode=2
    goto :error
  )
)
goto :end
:error
echo.
pause
:end
exit %BatchFlag% %ExitCode%

 

It is possible to run XP & Win7 in a VM with no networking - this works fine for me on all apps other than gaming, and I've been doing this for years with some XP & Win 7 instances. This way, you get to run whatever apps you want in a controlled environment, and you can be sure there's no dodgy privacy or exfiltration problems with any of them. Also, for quite some time, the main way I do internet facing stuff is with Linux VMs, often with snapshot reversion.
Of course, if you want to participate in the wonderful glories of Cortana and W10, you can do that too and reap the huge feature benefits and social networking rewards and warm in the knowledge that you're in safe hands...

 

A good thread:
http://forums.mydigitallife.info/th...and-Windows-10-Related-Updates-from-Windows-7