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Even when told not to, Windows 10 doesn't stop talking to Microsoft

arstechnica.co.uk

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Re: Even when told not to, Windows 10 doesn't stop talking to Microsoft

#2
> And finally, some traffic seems quite impenetrable. We configured our test virtual machine to use an HTTP and HTTPS proxy (both as a user-level proxy and a system-wide proxy) so that we could more easily monitor its traffic, but Windows 10 seems to make requests to a content delivery network that bypass the proxy.

Does this mean a Win10 machine setup to use something like Tor will leak the user's actual IP back to Microsoft? If you're VPN'd, is some traffic still leaking outside of the VPN?

From an engineering perspective, how is this happening? Does Microsoft have a second network interface hidden away using hardcoded settings for DNS, etc?

On a somewhat related note, if a Win10 app is cert pinning, is there a way to force it to use your cert so you can MITM it?

Re: Even when told not to, Windows 10 doesn't stop talking to Microsoft

#3

> And finally, some traffic seems quite impenetrable. We configured our test virtual machine to use an HTTP and HTTPS proxy (both as a user-level proxy and a system-wide proxy) so that we could more easily monitor its traffic, but Windows 10 seems to make requests to a content delivery network that bypass the proxy. Does this mean a Win10 machine setup to use something like Tor will leak the user's actual IP back to…

What they are describing isn't necessarily cert pinning, although it's possible there is also cert pinning. It just means there are hard-coded IP addresses somewhere; either a hard-coded DNS server, or the endpoint itself.

Notably, it's still possible to MITM the traffic, just not as easy as if the system respected the proxy settings. You need to spoof the destination IP and try to terminate the TLS with your own trusted cert. If the connection still fails, only then would you know there is a cert pin. I haven't heard if anyone has tried this with the "CDN"-bound traffic, or the persistent bing.com/live.com traffic.

If a VPN was being used, I would expect traffic would still be routed through the VPN interface. The HTTP(S) proxy code is higher up the stack than a VPN interface.

It does raise a huge red flag though, if you are not fully in control of your own network routing using standard tooling, IMO it's not an appropriate OS for any enterprise environment.

Re: Even when told not to, Windows 10 doesn't stop talking to Microsoft

#4
From the image of the captured data that is sent when telemetry is "off", a few bits are obviously Windows-style UTF-16. The GUID is obvious, and is that an assert error message? Very strange...

    prod
    e5ff4669-311a-0933-dee2-9444eee86460

    instrumentation.cpp
    Instrumentation::StartQosExperience
    (Utilities::HashMapContains(_qosUXScenarioDataById, scenerioId) == false)
    Assertfailed: (Utilities::HashMapContains(_qosUXScenarioDataById, scenerioId) == false):
    Instrumentation is active when we try 
(it cuts off after "try")

Re: Even when told not to, Windows 10 doesn't stop talking to Microsoft

#5

> And finally, some traffic seems quite impenetrable. We configured our test virtual machine to use an HTTP and HTTPS proxy (both as a user-level proxy and a system-wide proxy) so that we could more easily monitor its traffic, but Windows 10 seems to make requests to a content delivery network that bypass the proxy. Does this mean a Win10 machine setup to use something like Tor will leak the user's actual IP back to…

I've been on Windows 10 for a couple of days now.

VPN traffic doesn't leak if the default route is the VPN interface. I tried it and my firewall went silent apart from the tunnel.

I have absolutely no fucking idea what it is sending out though. It's always talking to something. I've turned everything off that is documented and use a local account and remove-appxpackage'd everything. Sorry but this release is a write off. My host/vm relation is being inverted to Ubuntu as a host this week rather than a guest.

If I don't know what it's doing, how can I trust it?

Re: Even when told not to, Windows 10 doesn't stop talking to Microsoft

#7
In all these discussions about Windows 10 phoning home, there are a couple of things that I haven't yet seen properly discussed.

1. Do the different versions of Windows (Home/Pro/Enterprise/Education) behave differently? If so, how?

2. Do the pro/enterprise versions behave differently when they're connected to a domain?

I'd imagine that the answer to at least one of these questions would be "yes." This kind of behaviour would be a deal-breaker in many enterprises.

Re: Even when told not to, Windows 10 doesn't stop talking to Microsoft

#9

In all these discussions about Windows 10 phoning home, there are a couple of things that I haven't yet seen properly discussed. 1. Do the different versions of Windows (Home/Pro/Enterprise/Education) behave differently? If so, how? 2. Do the pro/enterprise versions behave differently when they're connected to a domain? I'd imagine that the answer to at least one of these questions would be "yes." This kind of behavi…

I'd like to know the difference between free upgrades and Win10 installs with a real product key
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