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Intel's GPU Drivers Now Collect Telemetry, Including 'How You Use Your Computer'

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Re: Intel's GPU Drivers Now Collect Telemetry, Including 'How You Use Your Computer'

#141

Post by notaustinpowers »

the_lego wrote: post #66
rvnx wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If they would collect what games you are playing, to know on which games they have to optimize the drivers / framerate down-the-road that'd be ok. But websites you visit...

It would be useful , it would not be ok. It's still an invasion of privacy, and Intel has no business knowing I play (and how much), e.g., a gay dating simulator, Postal, Hogwarts Legacy, or any number of other games that either are or will be controversial, incriminating, or just useful as another data point in a personality profile. So many of the devil's advocate posts justify it by explaining how spying on users…

Exactly, this information being harvested can 100% be used against you.

For example, Texas Attorney General, Ken Paxton, attempted to secure a list of every Texan who changed their gender within the past 24 months, stating they may need drivers license numbers in the future to look up their information. The only reason that didn't happen is because the Department of Public Safety said they couldn't accurately produce that information.

Just imagine a state, or a foreign government subpoenaing or hacking Nvidia to get this information they're collecting. Now that state or foreign government doesn't just have your browser history like if they subpoenaed your ISP. They have everything you did on that computer. What's on your hard drive, what games you played, what devices are connected to your computer, etc.

I try to not go down the slippery slope analogies, but a company having this treasure trove of information on 82% of desktop users is going to make it ripe for hacking and state-sanctioned spying.

Re: Intel's GPU Drivers Now Collect Telemetry, Including 'How You Use Your Computer'

#142

Post by Espionage724 »

shrimp_emoji wrote: post #140
JohnFen wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Microsoft isn't crippling their user experience considering that doesn't benefit them I have to use Windows at work, and have done so for decades. From where I sit, Microsoft is absolutely crippling the user experience. Every release after Win 7 has been a degradation in that.

Compare KDE's Dolphin with Windows's Explorer (tabs, split view, dark theme a decade ago, file size/mod date under filename...) Ten Dutch guys can make for free a better piece of software than a multi-billion dollar corporation can because better UX isn't profitable when you've already captured 99% of the market. :p

KDE is not relevant or even heard of aside from people on Arch forums and more isolated communities. Heck the rare times I've seen Linux in the wild, guess what DE they were using? It's the one that's actually used by mainstream Linux distros, and even outside of GNOME, I even saw a wild Ubuntu terminal running Unity about a week ago. KDE should stop assisting with fragmenting Linux, or get the DE up-to-par for mainsream distros to use :p

Meanwhile, guess what's the most popular operating systems for workstation use is. You're implying everyone using Windows willingly is dumb and being inefficient. Dolphin works, so does Explorer, Nautilus, and even Thunar. Only two of those are relevant for most people.

Re: Intel's GPU Drivers Now Collect Telemetry, Including 'How You Use Your Computer'

#143

Post by Espionage724 »

GrinningFool wrote: post #132
Espionage724 wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lmao. Anyone who cares about this likely isn't using Windows to begin with, and has already fallen into some Parabola Trisquel rabbit hole. Microsoft isn't crippling their user experience considering that doesn't benefit them; it's bad-actors cultivating that idea to push people on less-secure platforms, and/or naive Arch Linux first-time installer bros that want to push the idea of a worst desktop experience everywh…

> or leak data that I share with them in some manner Like when their video drivers overstep their bounds and gather information on what applications are run and what websites are visited?

No, not like that at all lmao

Just wait until you hear about your cursor being tracked on pages and what images and positions on the site you hover and stop scrolling over :p

Intel isn't giving my browser data to enemies of the state. What do you really think Intel is doing with this information?

And yeah, website URLs are important since people want to bootstrap and toss WebGL all over the place needlessly; all that is GPU accelerated. Blame anyone not using a plain-text website.

Re: Intel's GPU Drivers Now Collect Telemetry, Including 'How You Use Your Computer'

#144

Post by Espionage724 »

JohnFen wrote: post #109
Espionage724 wrote: post #93

Great! I want Intel to improve the driver stack I use on my hardware, and if information how I use their graphics stack is useful for that, cool. I continue on my usual usage, and Intel gets data on how to improve the experience for free. How does anyone expect software to improve if nobody gives feedback? Ya'll know those website surveys, bug report apps in GPU control panels? If people used those, maybe secret tele…

> If people used those, maybe secret telemetry wouldn't be required. That argument is simple extortion. Secret telemetry is never required, period. If people are unwilling to volunteer such data, then the devs simply have to do without. If that means that software won't improve[1], too bad. [1] Which isn't what that means. Software has always been improving even back when spying on people wasn't a feasible thing to d…

It's not spying. Spying implies being observed without consent, and that the adversary is gaining information to use against you. The average person who is using Windows and likely the only ones to see this do not fall under this.

People were unwilling to volunteer the data exactly because of this fear-mongering. Ya'll act like Intel is sitting in a back room watching flowing logcats of your activity and cherry-picking ones to target you personally, as if some of ya'll are that important lmao :p

Re: Intel's GPU Drivers Now Collect Telemetry, Including 'How You Use Your Computer'

#145

Post by Espionage724 »

nine_k wrote: post #136
Espionage724 wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is that a problem? Nobody is reviewing open-source driver code aside from the people actually working on improving it. Also lmao; do you really believe Intel is going to sabotage their own platform? If you're doing something so "nefarious and underhanded" on your computer for that to be a concern, you likely have no reason to be concerned since you should be using a platform and OS that makes this a non-issue. On…

Not only bad actors would be concerned. There is a rather small but vocal minority that values privacy extremely high. They make noise, even when a threat of identification, or of siphoning out any consequential information, is extremely low. To avoid sabotaging their own platform, Intel should remember about that, and give no food for bad PR. As they write in employment agreements, you should avoid any real conflict…

Part of that vocal minority is naive and was likely manipulated to push views that only benefit bad-actors.

If people were being sincere, they wouldn't be so vague in detailing how Intel is going to use this information maliciously.

Re: Intel's GPU Drivers Now Collect Telemetry, Including 'How You Use Your Computer'

#146

Post by daneel_w »

WirelessGigabit wrote: post #67
mastax wrote: post #38

I know that Nvidia does extensive telemetry with GeForce Experience (the optional but heavily pushed companion software to the driver) but do they do it in the driver package also? The article makes no distinction and says there's no opt out. I thought choosing to not install GeForce Experience was the opt out (though that is not communicated to you at all during installation).

And it's the only way to get auto software updates.

Microsoft provides updates for just the GPU driver through Windows Update if you tick the box for that.

Re: Intel's GPU Drivers Now Collect Telemetry, Including 'How You Use Your Computer'

#147

Post by Espionage724 »

nine_k wrote: post #136
Espionage724 wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is that a problem? Nobody is reviewing open-source driver code aside from the people actually working on improving it. Also lmao; do you really believe Intel is going to sabotage their own platform? If you're doing something so "nefarious and underhanded" on your computer for that to be a concern, you likely have no reason to be concerned since you should be using a platform and OS that makes this a non-issue. On…

Not only bad actors would be concerned. There is a rather small but vocal minority that values privacy extremely high. They make noise, even when a threat of identification, or of siphoning out any consequential information, is extremely low. To avoid sabotaging their own platform, Intel should remember about that, and give no food for bad PR. As they write in employment agreements, you should avoid any real conflict…

Yeah there might be one person discussing this in social media that legitimately values privacy.

If you value privacy, you aren't using Windows. If you value privacy, you should realize that most people only care about it to the extent of it just working, and it only does so for most people running major Windows and macOS desktop operating systems If you value privacy, then you know how to read Microsoft's privacy policy to know what your data is going towards on Windows. And if you value privacy, you can respect why Intel is doing this and also read their privacy policy as to how they use the data.

People are fear-mongering that Intel is taking usage data as if Intel has some interest in using the data maliciously. None of these major companies increasing and gathering telemetry have used the data in a truly malicious manner, unless you twist the wording for specific situations where bad-actors got caught doing bad-actor activity and have to comply with legal requests for information.

This is only beneficial for the audience Intel is targeting.

Re: Intel's GPU Drivers Now Collect Telemetry, Including 'How You Use Your Computer'

#149

Post by TimeBearingDown »

WirelessGigabit wrote: post #67
mastax wrote: post #38

I know that Nvidia does extensive telemetry with GeForce Experience (the optional but heavily pushed companion software to the driver) but do they do it in the driver package also? The article makes no distinction and says there's no opt out. I thought choosing to not install GeForce Experience was the opt out (though that is not communicated to you at all during installation).

And it's the only way to get auto software updates.

NVCleanstall linked in another comment will also notify you of updates.

Re: Intel's GPU Drivers Now Collect Telemetry, Including 'How You Use Your Computer'

#150

Post by Terr_ »

JohnFen wrote: post #100
thefurdrake wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm still holding out from the days when basically everyone on the internet understood you shouldn't post intimate details about your life online (the age before social ~~cancer~~ media). I long for a return to common sense. Maybe AI will do the trick, but I doubt it. Plenty of people are happy with behavioral prediction if it means convenience without caring about the implications.

I agree. That said, there's a huge difference between voluntarily offering up personal data in a public forum and having personal data extracted without your consent.

Another aspect--even if the disclosure is voluntary--involves channels which go through our evolved human social filters (like expectations of how that data will spread) and channels that bypass or subvert them.

For example, if I express a controversial opinion to a friend, some part of my mind is running a safety calculation on that, as well as considering who that person might tell and whether that would make next Thanksgiving with relatives awkward.

In contrast, I'm not thinking (even subconsciously) that some grammar checking software running on the other person's computer is going to pick up on the same keywords and then somehow ding my credit score.

The company or code isn't even a person present anywhere near the conversation. I have a reasonable expectation of privacy, and no amount of flim-flam in a ToS is changing that unless the code pops up like Clippy to signal its presence.

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