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Microsoft to delay release of Recall AI feature on security concerns

reuters.com

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Re: Microsoft to delay release of Recall AI feature on security concerns

#231

Post by jahewson »

Rinzler89 wrote: post #61

What a dumb feature. They had to get all that backlash to understand why everyone wouldn't want it. Is someone at Microsoft taking crazy pills to think consumers would be into that? They pulled the exact same shit 11 years ago when they launched the Xbox One as a "home media center" instead of a gaming console and it came with mandatory always-on internet connection, disc games DRM tied to a single console unable to…

To answer your question about the Xbox One, I visited Microsoft Research during the development of the 2nd Kinect and the researchers were excited about all the technology they were going to pack into it and the great success that it would be - compared with their usual business of making prototypes that never see the light of day or are quickly killed off.

It’s well known that Microsoft is a very divisional company with internal frictions, and I think what we saw with the Xbox One is that anyone who convincingly could shove their technology into the product lobbied hard for that. Perhaps because they knew the alternative for them was irrelevance.

Re: Microsoft to delay release of Recall AI feature on security concerns

#232

Post by janjones »

nofunsir wrote: post #155

There was a post on HN not too long ago about a random 3rd party/open source tool that does exactly this, no? When I first heard about Recall AI, I immediately thought back to that HN article, but can't find it.

What an irony. If you had Recall or that tool you mention installed, you could probably find it easily :D

Re: Microsoft to delay release of Recall AI feature on security concerns

#233

Post by chollida1 »

vsuperpower2020 wrote: post #149
red_admiral wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As far as I know, a long while ago, the Islamic Republic of Iran asked Cisco to develop a filtering solution to stop their citizens from accessing undesirable content. Cisco said no. Then US companies started asking for filters to stop their employees watching porn at work, Cisco invented a centralised domain/packet filtering solution for their routers, and Iran went "can we buy one of those, please?". My take is tha…

When would this be useful? Microsoft's best examples are that the user forgot the location of a chinese food place your friend told you once.

Easy answer. It's a built in history.

I use bash history all the time, I use my browser history all the time.

To be able to use an OS history would be amazing.

What was the name of the esoteric software i was using to program my lego robot,

What was I working on last Thursday so I can fill out the government required SHRED report to get the Canadian RnD tax rebate.

What was the song i was listening to that Spotify played last Tuesday afternoon.

There are so many times i'd use a feature like this.

Re: Microsoft to delay release of Recall AI feature on security concerns

#234

Post by godelski »

sirspacey wrote: post #225
neltnerb wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I do not think it is cynical to assume that Microsoft would sell this to companies as a way to do constant surveillance of their employees with OCR and LLMs used to make it easier for a manager to sift through massive amounts of data. That's just an actual use case that their true customers would pay for, I think it's awful and should be illegal under any reasonable worker protections but why would they not advertise…

You’ve got a point. Presuming you are correct, what do you think happens when the team has been culled? Union busting & screen tracking already works pretty well as is for the goals you’ve outline. We usually think about tracking/measurement as Big Brother looking over our shoulder, but all of us are living a day-to-day reality of losing context and having to invest a lot of effort and time to get it back (usually on…

> Union busting & screen tracking already works pretty well as is for the goals you’ve outline.

I don't think I understand your point here. It feels as if you're framing this as a binary decision/outcome. Personally I see Relay making such abuse easier. So I don't think the existence of bad acts in any way lessens the potential harm of Relay.

> We usually think about tracking/measurement as Big Brother looking over our shoulder, but all of us are living a day-to-day reality of losing context and having to invest a lot of effort and time to get it back (usually only partially).

I also don't understand this. Do you keep notes? If the problem is quite large for you, I think you should take more notes and likely better notes (a skill in of itself). Yes, this has cost, but so does everything. There is no free lunch. But notes are distilled while technologies like Relay are dragnets. And at the root of your argument is the recognition that information is powerful. So you have to ask what information has power and to who. Because information that may not be useful to you may be useful to others who wish to use power against you. And in those scenarios, I don't know about you, but I'd rather have distilled information, and more specifically be more aware of what information is being stored, than just scoop up everything.

Personally, I just don't think it is very hard to take notes.

Re: Microsoft to delay release of Recall AI feature on security concerns

#235

Post by waynesonfire »

neltnerb wrote: post #108
simonw wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a very cynical take. I've not seen anything to make me think this feature is intended for surveillance as opposed to personal utility. The personal utility benefits are very clear to me - the problem is the ease with which malicious attackers might steal the data (if they can breach the system).

I do not think it is cynical to assume that Microsoft would sell this to companies as a way to do constant surveillance of their employees with OCR and LLMs used to make it easier for a manager to sift through massive amounts of data. That's just an actual use case that their true customers would pay for, I think it's awful and should be illegal under any reasonable worker protections but why would they not advertise…

I agree it's not cynical. But MSFT doesn't give a shit about surveilling employee computers for PIP purposes. Like, really? A 3 trillion dollar company and this is how they're going to add shareholder value?

They need data to feed their LLM / AI models. Period.

Re: Microsoft to delay release of Recall AI feature on security concerns

#236

Post by hbn »

frithsun wrote: post #163

What's interesting to me is that AI hype accidentally got non technical people thinking and talking more about their privacy and security concerns relating to software. There's nothing sinister about LLMs relative to the kind of data collection big tech has been up to for years and years. It's just that all the AGI spin has triggered a defensive response in people. Positive, in my opinion. People should be approachin…

There did not previously exist screenshots of everything my monitor displays any time I'm using my computer, and I don't want that data to exist. Sure, a lot of my activity could be pieced together from various other things that track my activity, but constant screenshots of everything that was on my monitor is a centralized goldmine of data that I don't want anyone to have access to.

I'd say that is more sinister than most other data collection.

Re: Microsoft to delay release of Recall AI feature on security concerns

#237

Post by midtake »

I don't think Microsoft understands security. They use phrases like "secure by default" as if Recall is anything but, and it looks like "just-in-time" security requires Windows Hello, which I also don't want.

I'm sorry but what little faith I had in Windows has absolutely dried up. If I didn't use Windows for video games with an Nvidia card, I would have no personal use for Windows. MacOS and Linux have been amazing lately and it seems like a downgrade every time I switch to my windows PC.

Re: Microsoft to delay release of Recall AI feature on security concerns

#239

Post by [deleted] »

simonw wrote: post #90
segasaturn wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My takeaway is that Microsoft has been trying to boil the frog, but slipped and turned the temperature up too quickly. They're retreating for now, but make no mistake that Recall will slowly trickle back into Windows under another name. Every major power broker wants something like Recall to become the norm - bosses to spy on their employees, governments to spy on their citizens/enemies, and tech CEO's to collect tra…

This is a very cynical take. I've not seen anything to make me think this feature is intended for surveillance as opposed to personal utility. The personal utility benefits are very clear to me - the problem is the ease with which malicious attackers might steal the data (if they can breach the system).

[deleted]

Re: Microsoft to delay release of Recall AI feature on security concerns

#240

Post by devsda »

ryandrake wrote: post #120
surfingdino wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

TPM was met with resistance due to privacy concerns and Microsoft quietly re-introduced it anyway. The same will happen to Recall.

It's the same playbook every company uses, who want to feed us something we don't like. They'll try again and again. Maybe they'll add sugar to the medicine, maybe they'll wave the spoon around and make airplane noises, maybe they'll distract us with a toy and jam the spoon in when we aren't expecting it, maybe they'll hold us down and give it as a suppository. One way or another, the baby is going to take the medici…

Another example comes from Facebook/Meta.

When WhatsApp forced accepting terms that affect privacy, they faced huge backlash and many were migrating to alternatives like signal & telegram. In response WhatsApp didn't backout of new the policy but just removed the enforcement deadline.

Now they silently and randomly show an annoying popup asking users to agree to the new privacy terms. The dialog is strategically placed and designed to collect as many accidental as clicks possible.

Sadly, the strategy worked for them and nobody cares about the new terms any more.

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