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Windows 11 is closing a loophole that let you skip making a Microsoft account

theverge.com

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Re: Windows 11 is closing a loophole that let you skip making a Microsoft account

#11

Post by colordrops »

jwoglom wrote: post #3

> We’re removing the bypassnro.cmd script from the build to enhance security and user experience of Windows 11. This change ensures that all users exit setup with internet connectivity and a Microsoft Account. "enhancing security and user experience" -- what a ridiculous, bold-faced lie. Bravo Microsoft.

It's standard practice for corporations to lie about their motivations for decisions. Why is this acceptable?

Re: Windows 11 is closing a loophole that let you skip making a Microsoft account

#12

Post by woleium »

mholt wrote: post #6

How can you set up / use Windows without an Internet connection? Surely that's not an unsupported use case anymore, is it? There's gotta be plenty of places where Internet connectivity is not available or is restricted.

enterprise deployments are different

Re: Windows 11 is closing a loophole that let you skip making a Microsoft account

#13

Post by p0w3n3d »

jwoglom wrote: post #3

> We’re removing the bypassnro.cmd script from the build to enhance security and user experience of Windows 11. This change ensures that all users exit setup with internet connectivity and a Microsoft Account. "enhancing security and user experience" -- what a ridiculous, bold-faced lie. Bravo Microsoft.

Can't it be added again by users? Cmd does not sound like a complicated piece of binary code

Re: Windows 11 is closing a loophole that let you skip making a Microsoft account

#14

Post by bigstrat2003 »

colordrops wrote: post #11
jwoglom wrote: post #3

> We’re removing the bypassnro.cmd script from the build to enhance security and user experience of Windows 11. This change ensures that all users exit setup with internet connectivity and a Microsoft Account. "enhancing security and user experience" -- what a ridiculous, bold-faced lie. Bravo Microsoft.

It's standard practice for corporations to lie about their motivations for decisions. Why is this acceptable?

It's not. But not all unacceptable things are illegal. And just as immoral people will do legal-but immoral things, immoral corporations will do the same.

Re: Windows 11 is closing a loophole that let you skip making a Microsoft account

#17

Post by TechDebtDevin »

qwerpy wrote: post #15

What is MS's motivation to push so strongly to have everyone on a Microsoft account? I really hope it's not primarily so that they can more effectively target your computer for ads. Or upsell some service subscriptions.

I have some bad news for you.

Re: Windows 11 is closing a loophole that let you skip making a Microsoft account

#20

Post by vbezhenar »

p0w3n3d wrote: post #13
jwoglom wrote: post #3

> We’re removing the bypassnro.cmd script from the build to enhance security and user experience of Windows 11. This change ensures that all users exit setup with internet connectivity and a Microsoft Account. "enhancing security and user experience" -- what a ridiculous, bold-faced lie. Bravo Microsoft.

Can't it be added again by users? Cmd does not sound like a complicated piece of binary code

This script just added single key to the registry and rebooted the machine (restarting the installer). The underlying functionality which allowed to use local user, if registry key was present, was coded into the installer itself.

So if they just removed that 2-line bat file, it's not a big problem. You still can add that entry to the registry, just with more complicated command.

Here's its code:

    @echo off
    reg add HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\OOBE /v BypassNRO /t REG_DWORD /d 1 /f
    shutdown /r /t 0
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