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Microsoft Admits Windows 10 Automatic Spying Cannot Be Stopped

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Re: Microsoft Admits Windows 10 Automatic Spying Cannot Be Stopped

#51

Post by click170 »

"Cannot be stopped"

What a crock.

All you have to do is care enough to install a proper gateway firewall that can intercept and block these requests before they leave your network.

Companies will only encroach more and more on your privacy all the while telling you there's nothing wrong and it can't be disabled and that its just a little bit of your privacy [that they're forcibly stealing].

Stop being complicit in it and do something about it. You'll feel much better about everything when you do.

Re: Microsoft Admits Windows 10 Automatic Spying Cannot Be Stopped

#52

Post by yuhong »

username223 wrote: post #6

Ugh, the "cloud" comes to the desktop. Companies like to have all kinds of telemetry and forced non-security updates, both of which are easy to have with a hosted application. "You'll take whatever we throw up on the server, and we'll watch you like it." Some of us poor software users don't always like one or both of these things, and client-side software is great at avoiding them: you choose when to install newer ve…

Yea, MS has make it clear "Windows as a Service" is deliberate. Win10 Enterprise has the LTSB for long term servicing.

Re: Microsoft Admits Windows 10 Automatic Spying Cannot Be Stopped

#53

Post by yuhong »

TheOtherHobbes wrote: post #32
lvs wrote: post #20

What's amazing about this telemetry issue and the forced upgrade path is that, at the same time, they're trying to fight the PR problem by claiming that they might soon have a more reasonable FOSS (or at least OSS) mentality, will contribute to openssh, etc., all as part of their new "customer-oriented culture." It's really just a carrot-and-stick, isn't it?

It's more like carrot and nuclear fail bomb. Is there anyone in MS management here who can explain how and why this is supposed to be a customer winning idea, and how it won't launch a stampede towards OS X and Linux? "Okay, so we do the spying thing with everything you type. But - scout's honour - we don't do it all that much. Honest!" Corporate dementia is becoming more and more of a problem in enterprise scale IT.…

It is called "Windows as a Service" for a reason.

Re: Microsoft Admits Windows 10 Automatic Spying Cannot Be Stopped

#54

Post by beeboop »

click170 wrote: post #51

"Cannot be stopped" What a crock. All you have to do is care enough to install a proper gateway firewall that can intercept and block these requests before they leave your network. Companies will only encroach more and more on your privacy all the while telling you there's nothing wrong and it can't be disabled and that its just a little bit of your privacy [that they're forcibly stealing]. Stop being complicit in it…

I am a developer and pretty computer savvy, but I don't know the first thing about configuring a firewall and I suspect it would be pretty time consuming to even make an attempt at doing so. Regardless of what I did, I would not be confident that I actually blocked everything I needed to. This isn't a reasonable request of pretty much anyone except professional network administrators.

I just made the switch to Linux full time after all this Win10 privacy bullshit. Been Linux full time for 4 months with no problems, never going back to Windows.

Re: Microsoft Admits Windows 10 Automatic Spying Cannot Be Stopped

#55

Post by newman314 »

pdkl95 wrote: post #18
newman314 wrote: post #9

I posted this in a different thread but am reposting here for the folks that do move to Win10. -- PSA: For people with Windows 10 installed, I've found the following tool quite useful in shutting down the large amount of information collected and transmitted. http://www.oo-software.com/en/shutup10

Please, don't use these tools. Yes, they may fix the immediate problem, but you're still rewarding Microsoft with money and/or market share. You're sending them the message that you are loyal even when they abuse their power in obvious ways. By continuing to use their platform, you're conditioning[1] Microsoft to continue with stronger spyware in the future. Unless they see an actual reduction in revenue and fewer pe…

There is room for both practical as well as idealistic responses.

In this case, I'm picking my battle.

Re: Microsoft Admits Windows 10 Automatic Spying Cannot Be Stopped

#56

Post by newman314 »

blibble wrote: post #26
coolnow wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Okay, tell me how i can play all my Steam games then (no, not just the Source Engine ones).

personally I took it as an opportunity to finally try out VT-d gaming... so Linux on the bare metal, and Windows tightly locked down in a VM (on a separate vlan). MS are free to spy on me playing X-COM, but they won't be getting anything else...

How goes vt-d gaming? I was investigating if it was possible to pass through the igpu using VMware but never could get a straight answer.

Re: Microsoft Admits Windows 10 Automatic Spying Cannot Be Stopped

#57

Post by click170 »

beeboop wrote: post #54
click170 wrote: post #51

"Cannot be stopped" What a crock. All you have to do is care enough to install a proper gateway firewall that can intercept and block these requests before they leave your network. Companies will only encroach more and more on your privacy all the while telling you there's nothing wrong and it can't be disabled and that its just a little bit of your privacy [that they're forcibly stealing]. Stop being complicit in it…

I am a developer and pretty computer savvy, but I don't know the first thing about configuring a firewall and I suspect it would be pretty time consuming to even make an attempt at doing so. Regardless of what I did, I would not be confident that I actually blocked everything I needed to. This isn't a reasonable request of pretty much anyone except professional network administrators. I just made the switch to Linux…

That's a fair point, but you gotta start somewhere (if you have an interest and an inkling that is) or just give in and let them take what they want.

I started by configuring it to block everything by default and white listing the traffic I wanted to allow. Most systems will log dropped or anomalous traffic so its very easy to work out what traffic needs to be allowed when some new game's multiplayer features don't work as expected. And as an added bonus you learn a lot about networking at the same time, possibly opening up new career opportunities.

It might not be for everyone but if you value your privacy you owe it to yourself to explore your options. I suggest the Sophos UTM if you're just starting off, the UI is very friendly and helpful.

http://www.sophos.com/en-us/products/unified-threat-manageme...

Re: Microsoft Admits Windows 10 Automatic Spying Cannot Be Stopped

#58

Post by vardump »

korethr wrote: post #16
vardump wrote: post #11

Microsoft arbitrarily cripples or how it's called in business lingo "market segments" their products. Maybe their marketing felt Windows 10 was too good of a product and needed to make it artificially less desirable? Surely no professional or business user wants to be spied on? There are a lot of examples in the past too. Arbitrarily limiting 32-bit consumer versions to just 4 GB RAM. Letting just one user having an…

I disagree that the 4GB RAM cap is entirely arbitrary. Guess how many GiB of memory you can address with 32 bits? 4. Now, x86 CPUs have been capable of addressing more memory since the Pentium Pro [1]. But even then, not all motherboard chipsets supported that, probably because back in 1995, RAM was more commonly measured in megabytes, not gigabytes. Then consider that Microsoft discovered that some drivers became un…

Why are you talking about 1995? Talking about 2005 is more relevant here.

> I disagree that the 4GB RAM cap is entirely arbitrary. Guess how many GiB of memory you can address with 32 bits? 4.

That's completely irrelevant. You could still simultaneously a lot of processes each taking up to 3 GB RAM individually. All that matters is that different processes and drivers could utilize whole installed physical memory range. 2.5-3.5GB limit was already an issue in Windows XP era, when computers started to commonly have 4GB or more. 32-bit Windows XP could have handled up to 64 GB RAM just fine.

> Then consider that Microsoft discovered that some drivers became unstable when addressing more than 4GiB of RAM.

I've heard this one often, but never seen any concrete examples of drivers with such problems. What are these drivers actually? What kind of bugs? Say DMA buffers? Well, if the developer was incompetent enough to set 4GB max DMA buffer bit for PCI[e] hardware that can't address 4GB+... All other memory buffers would have mapped behind 32-bit pointers anyways, regardless of where they actually are in physical memory. You seldom deal with direct mapping even in kernel mode drivers.

For example, how about drivers that use PASSIVE_LEVEL functions at DPC or higher? Should they not trigger IRQL is less than equal blue screen as well? Buggy drivers are buggy drivers, period.

> complain when their computers become extra-crashy

Why would their computers be extra crashy? Windows 2003 server versions worked just fine with very much the same drivers without any crashing. Why would Windows XP have been any different?

By the way, I have written Windows kernel mode drivers.

Re: Microsoft Admits Windows 10 Automatic Spying Cannot Be Stopped

#59

Post by click170 »

rasz_pl wrote: post #48
yuhong wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think some traffic do bypass the firewall, but it is mostly licensing stuff.

Do you have any details? backdooring own firewall would be a HUGE deal.

Firewalls on hosts should really only be used for protection against inbound traffic, trying to use firewalls on a host to block that host from sending traffic a) doesn't scale on a network of many hosts and b) can be overriden if the thing trying to send traffic has root access to modify the firewall.

Gateway firewalls are much less susceptible to malicious modification this way, and IMO are the best way to protect yourself from this type of corporate spying in general.

Re: Microsoft Admits Windows 10 Automatic Spying Cannot Be Stopped

#60

Post by bhrgunatha »

McGlockenshire wrote: post #21
mmastrac wrote: post #14

Does Windows 10 actually log keystrokes? If so, that's pretty disturbing.

No, Windows 10 does not generally log keystrokes. The one and only place that things like keystroke logging are mentioned in the privacy policy is in the context of interacting with Cortana and the related search service, where the phrasing is similar to "things you enter here get sent to us, and we log those things." The vast majority of the Windows 10 privacy concerns are mitigated by turning off the Customer Exper…

It's been reported elsewhere that key strokes are logged. Whether it is limited i nature or not, the ability is there and is used.

Why?

What's the need for key strokes to be logged rather than just a complete edited search term sent to a server. Why does anyone need to know which keys I press on my computer?

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