Big Brother is watching you. Or something. Hence, this be article exploring the new privacy dashboard and user data collection policies in Windows 10, covering account setup, telemetry, cloud data, transparency, and ease of use, and more. The eye of the stranger is upon you, everything you type he will see, next time you're online look behind you, cause that's where the telemetry's gonna be. https://www.dedoimedo.com/computers/windows-10-telemetry.html Cheers, Mrk
I like this review Q. How does Windows 10 try to break the rules of physics? Q. What makes you think Windows 10 will ever be fully baked? And thanks for new phrase: "that's just nerd music"
1. The rules of physics - thumb size vs mouse pointer size: https://www.dedoimedo.com/computers/windows-blue-desktop-conspiracy.html 2. What makes me think it will be fully baked - ugh, optimism? Mrk
Nice piece Mrk, but I have an issue with something you said which I hear a lot, not just about MS, but other big players in the tech industry too. That makes it sounds like a very frivolous decision, like changing the brand of sneakers you buy, but there is a lot more to it than that. MS Gained the huge userbase it has, based on trust, the world took them at face value and invested heavily in them for decades of learning, product development, infrastructure building, user training, people have college degrees in MS. Millions of people's only experience of computing is on MS Windows and a large chunk of many of their lives has evolved around that, especially the business aspect. So to suggest at this point the world has this simple choice to just stop using MS now they have realized they cannot be trusted, is over simplifying the issue. IMO.
@RockLobster I agree. It's just not that simple for most who have invested heavily to change. What's worse is the M$ overreach was less at the start and with each new OS comes more invasive "features".
@Mrkvonic maybe you should have included the following links to your article before the conclusion. Windows 10, version 1709 basic level Windows diagnostic events and fields (169 minutes to read) Windows 10, version 1709 diagnostic data for the Full level (25 minutes to read) Windows Diagnostic Data Viewer program Because the answer in privacy and personal rights dilemmas is never easy especially in a worlwide scale. ps. Let's not forget that windows 10 is a rolling forced update/upgrade OS and it's privacy settings, as everything else on it, can and will change from one version to the next.
I might have issues with Windows 10, but you don't base switching totally over to somebody else s product/products on a bad experience with one of the company's product's. There is nothing simple about making a decision like that. Microsoft isn't all bad. but some people give customers the wrong impression.
Yes I didn't really emphasize that enough or that it is a lot more than just over reach. Their userbase became what it is because no one had an inkling that there was any reason not to trust them and why should they? No one had experienced such a thing as a manufacturer that conspired against its own customers to sell them a commercial product engineered to facilitate not only invasion of privacy but also third party intrusion and theft. There are always those that will argue, that is not true, well it is true. One Windows backdoor was discovered many years ago by European researchers. It consisted of two secret access keys hidden in advapi.dll. This dates back to W95, that is how long this has been going on. One of those keys was held by MS, the other by the NSA, their names KEY and NSAKEY were discovered later due to a debugging tool accidentally left in a release of NT4.
@RockLobster - Coming from a different non tech angle I always had an inbuilt distrust of both M$ and Apple so it's not news to me. What people here at Wilders research and put on the table is like a big confirmation. None of it surprises me, but Linux was too far above me when I started so I just tailored my online life to suit. Linux is a far better way but I wouldn't get a false sense of security there either. I'm still yet to try it as my main OS. What is sad is that in the face of numerous accounts posted across the net and on these forums testifying to an OS that was forced on them, you still have fanboys who either flatly deny it or couldn't care less. Of course then you're labelled as the tinfoil hat brigade and/or a conspiracy theorist.
@Reality I think the terms conspiracy theorist and tinfoil hat brigade have been taking on a new meaning in recent years, not least because these are the people that keep on getting proven right. Unfortunately it is usually years after the fact.
Correct me if I'm wrong. But to this day there hasn't been any confirmed maliciousness attributed to Microsoft's data collection. We only have assumptions from both sides.
@RockLobster - any time words morph into a wider meaning (classic example: teh-roar-rist) or even a different meaning altogether, it never ends well and in this case it's because it's not meant to. As for "conspiracy theorist" it's right up there as one of the most patently ridiculous nonsensical phrases around.
Well it depends on what you would "confirm as malicious". There are numerous posts at Wilders where people have battled with M$ telemetry. It's no assumption when an OS is forced on you and done in a way where people weren't aware. It's no assumption when settings you've set are changed back with upgrades, for example.
Nice article. "Should you trust Microsoft? The answer is very simple - if you do not, do not use its products." In the beginning I did not even think such things. The trust eroded slowly over the years. First by seeing the way the founder tried to sneakly kill the competition (and no matter how many millions or billions he gives to charities, it will not change a thing). Then later as his buddy got into charge and was downright hostile to alternatives. The current CEO is a mystery, a blackbox but judging by the last two versions (8 & 10) the directions is clearly in attempt to merge to unmergeable things (desktop and mobile), collect as much data as can be and then make a buck of it. I don't need that.
Microsoft's own data collection is not really the issue. Their facilitation of third party intrusion and theft is.
Agreed about the sentence: Often there's no option other than Windows. There're still Windows only programs, and when you share your PC w/ others who haven't heard of Linux, you're forced to use Windows. And on Home edition, there's no real opt-out. I heard recently blocking telemetry via FW can cause trouble for Windows update due to changes in MS server handling, not yet confirmed on my PC tho.
