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PSA: Intel Graphics Drivers Now Collect Telemetry by Default

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Re: PSA: Intel Graphics Drivers Now Collect Telemetry by Default

#51
What is the Mac OS side of telemetry looking like? It feels like Apple having commercials about how their computers don’t record everything you do would be a great knock against chrome os and windows, but I honestly don’t know if that’s true.

Re: PSA: Intel Graphics Drivers Now Collect Telemetry by Default

#53
You can count on the tech industry to provide you with a daily dose of outrage. This is very corrosive. Not only does it poison the well people want to use towards positive goals, but with tech being effectively unavoidable by anybody but extreme hermits, it creates a sense of complete and irreversible moral decay that permeates all of society.

Re: PSA: Intel Graphics Drivers Now Collect Telemetry by Default

#54
post #11

Which platforms does this apply on? The article doesn't mention eg Windows or Linux.

This is 650MB[1] Windows bloatware (now spyware) that gets installed alongside the driver. For 99.999% of users, it provides absolutely no benefit[2].

For Linux users, all that is required is a periodic update to the open source kernel, as well as proprietary firmware blobs, and open source Mesa software, and that's it. If you really feel it necessary to see statistics for your Intel GPU, there is a sysfs interface for doing so, and open source tools readily available to make it easy to view and use these statistics[3].

[1] https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/download/726609/inte...

[1] https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/products/docs/discre...

[2] https://gitlab.freedesktop.org/drm/igt-gpu-tools/-/blob/mast...

Re: PSA: Intel Graphics Drivers Now Collect Telemetry by Default

#55
post #49
post #31

Windows and its ecosystem have already become a telemetry monster; if you're fine with everything else, you ought to be fine with this. The linked Intel support page shows the simple instructions for opting out of the telemetry. Having said that, 2022 was already the year of the Linux desktop. Everything works. KDE gets better every week. Be the owner of your technology. Join us!

> Everything works. ...if you're a software engineer. If you need Photoshop or Word or another industry standard software then you don't count.

> If you need Photoshop or Word or another industry standard software then you don't count.

But you can always use GIMP, right?!

OK, this was a bad joke.

Re: PSA: Intel Graphics Drivers Now Collect Telemetry by Default

#56
post #9

How can engineers working on this even look at themselves without being ashamed? For the record: I'm a graphics driver engineer myself.

Pretty sure Intel would be happy to apply a level of indirection through external contractors to get this done either way. That's the world we live in. I don't see how engineers at Intel would risk antagonising whoever dreamt this up.

Re: PSA: Intel Graphics Drivers Now Collect Telemetry by Default

#57
post #9

How can engineers working on this even look at themselves without being ashamed? For the record: I'm a graphics driver engineer myself.

Rationalization. I've seen developers I thought were reasonable doing much worse things with cellphones.

I'd be interested to hear more about the cellphone bit, if you're willing to share.

Re: PSA: Intel Graphics Drivers Now Collect Telemetry by Default

#58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Intel is suffering financially. This is the phase in which they, regretfully, cross all ethical boundaries for the sake of the company's bottom line.

If that's not the reason Nvidia is doing it too, why should we believe this is the reason Intel is doing it? Truth is they're just greedy and they're doing it because they can. Edit for FirmwareBurner: I will, after you point out the part of my comment in which I claim that some F500 companies aren't greedy.

Please show me a F500 publicly listed company that isn't greedy.

The way our capitalist economy functions and CEO compensations are set, encourages nothing but greed and short therm profits at the expense of everything else.

Re: PSA: Intel Graphics Drivers Now Collect Telemetry by Default

#59
post #15

Telemetry by default should be illegal. They should be required to obtain owner permission.

I wish we could all pool money and buyout politicians in some tiny corner of the globe to pass laws that made all telemetry illegal for any device that entered their geography and allowed hefty fines for even basic data collection.

Re: PSA: Intel Graphics Drivers Now Collect Telemetry by Default

#60

After having realized that I don't know and can't put into exact words what harm telemetry represents for me personally, I stopped caring and I always opt in to share as much of my telemetry info as possible

I get not being bothered enough to opt out.. but actively opting in? What's the motivation there?
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