It seems that not only aren't people leaping to Windows 10 and allowing Microsoft permission to collect their metadata but far too many who use Windows 7 or 8 are opting out of the program. KB3080149 is a recent 'Update for customer experience and diagnostic telemetry' which will enable Microsoft to track your usage even though you explicitly opted out of the Customer Experience Improvement Programme. At least the data sent is encrypted, little consolation for users as The Inquirer points out.
"MICROSOFT HAS BEGUN retrofitting some of the more controversial aspects of the new Windows 10 operating system to predecessors 7 and 8."
Here is some more Tech News from around the web:
- Core M-based Compute Stick coming early next year @ The Tech Report
- No plans for a socketed Skylake with eDRAM @ The Tech Report
- Hidden password-stealing malware lurking in your GPU card? Intel Security thinks not @ The Register
- Intel, NSF tip dollars into IoT security @ The Register
7 & 8 users can still opt NOT
7 & 8 users can still opt NOT to download that update. Windows 10 users…
It was a required update
It was a required update before under a different KB then re-released as another KB as a recommended update.
So it got pushed to a lot of used and installed w/o their permission.
I don’t get what the hell
I don’t get what the hell Microsoft is doing. I don’t want a social operating system if that’s the “good” use of the data that they’re collecting. Any nefarious ideas not withstanding. Between the privacy concerns and forced updates where you need a separate package to block ones from Microsoft (WTF?) it’s about the only thing holding me back.
All of this stuff is
All of this stuff is telemetry. This means, if you are using a program, and it crashes, the stack, or the entire memory of the program at the time of the crash, is sent to Microsoft.
If you use the start menu, how many applications you pin, but not what applications, are sent to Microsoft. You know, all the same things THAT EVERY PROGRAM YOU INSTALL ON YOUR COMPUTER, INCLUDING GAMES, DOES!
Why do they do this? For programs, it gives the engineering team an idea on what pain points to fix, what features are popular, and where the program is encountering issues.
For games, some companies are using it to discover if a puzzle is to hard, or just not discoverable, so they can increase the enjoyment of the game.
For Microsoft, it allowed them in Windows 7 to tell how the underlying changes they shipped in each update affected the user. This was before Windows 8, btw.
I fail to see what the problem is, since all of this stuff was in Windows ages ago. They are just introducing more metrics so they can continue to test for their customer bases use case.
They aren’t getting your phone number, Microsoft BOB isn’t going to call you, Clippy isn’t returning from the dead.
If you don’t like Microsoft, fine, but don’t freak out when a software company does standard industry practices to its software.
Just don’t use their software. It is possible, people do it all the time. OS X, which does the same things, is an option, or use a Linux distro. Ubuntu does the same thing, but you may be able to get by with the BSDs.
Well said.
Well said.
Apple is not trying to shove
Apple is not trying to shove OSX, or its closed ecosystem onto third party laptop/PC OEM hardware, and all new third party OEM laptop/PC hardware should not be bound by any OS pre-installment/bundling agreements! Let all new hardware come with a third party industry standards organization in charge of the Secure Boot key signing authority, and no one single monopoly interest in charge of anyone’s independently manufactured third party OEM PC/Laptop hardware, or UEFI/BIOS. Make the UEFI/BIOS system an open standards type of system just like PCI, and other standards, with a code base open to all! All new PC/laptop hardware should come with install media for the device’s drivers, and drivers available for windows, Linux, BSD, etc. let the user choose the install media for their OS of choice, and let the user have the final say. No more having to purchase an OS with the hardware just to get the hardware in order to install a different OS of the user’s choosing. The Independent third party PC/Laptop market needs to be made actually Independent!
User computer privacy should be strictly enforced, with no by the OS/software makers automatic opt-ins, and the user forced to opt-out, it should be up to the user what to share! The user should not be an eternal BETA tester for any OS/others software unless the user chooses to be. These EULAs are going a bit too far and need to be restricted in their reach!
You can turn it off in OS X.
You can turn it off in OS X. You can turn it off in Linux if you enabled it in the first place. If they want the crash metrics, they can ask me for it nicely when something crashes. Otherwise it’s none of their business.
The obvious move is for MS to give an option for everyone to turn it off. Which covers the vocal few who want it off. Most people never will disable it, but making it difficult to disable draws bad press. Why bother when you can end the whining?
I’m not really sure what the
I’m not really sure what the need is to add more telemetry. Remember, this infrastructure was already in place since at least vista, also known as ‘Windows Error Reporting’. I imagine what the “problem” was is that its too darn optional.
On Win 7, Do Not install any
On Win 7, Do Not install any M$ updates but the ones clearly marked as security updates, and even then you are not sure! I remember at one time downloading and approving for install just 12 windows 7 security updates, but when I checked the list of installed updates there were 13 KBs listed as installed on that date.
This is what happens when you let your elected officials pull the rains on the Justice Department’s antitrust division, they’ll ignore the Sherman act and let the monopolies flourish. Now and for a few decades these Independent laptop/PC OEM’s have been anything but Independent, and M$ and Intel have turned the Independent Laptop/PC OEMs into little more than De Facto divisions of their parts suppliers. Who could have imagined that the independent OEMs would come under such complete control of a few of their parts suppliers. This is why your OEM’s OS supplier can force its will upon you, and you can barely find any Laptops with AMD’s newest APUs with decent screen, wattage, and other options.
Until there is the rise of some serious TRUST busters, enjoy your new gilded age!
Hopefully there will be more Steam OS options in the future, for both PCs and laptops, because the current crop of windows OEMs have rings through their noses, or fat brown envelopes in their pockets, and most likely both!!!
Edit: pull the rains
To :
Edit: pull the rains
To : pull the reins
There’s more than the one
There’s more than the one update that’s listed in this article.
[url]http://www.ghacks.net/2015/08/28/microsoft-intensifies-data-collection-on-windows-7-and-8-systems/[/url]
I’ve removed all of those updates and disabled windows update on all my windows machines. I might get lucky and not have a security breach on any future vulnerability that I don’t patch. I know for sure that I won’t be able to stop Microsoft from spying on me. I’ll pick the lesser of two evils.
If I recall right Windows
If I recall right Windows Update actually introduced some of those other updates before Windows 10 had officially rolled out, when they were still in the public testing phase…
For anyone who wants to be safe on 7 and 8 from Microsoft’s crap, uninstall telemetry updates, stop and remove the DiagTrack service, do not update unless you are sure the update does not contain tracking crap (you can’t 100% especially since they’re not going to be detailing what is in updates anymore), and make the necessary changes in Group Policy. A step farther should be properly configuring your firewall to block incoming and outgoing microsoft domains (hosts file or software firewall wrappers will not work for MS domains). Pretty sad we have to go this far to protect ourselves from our own operating systems. If only Linux had the library of software Windows does.
I did the same, uninstalled
I did the same, uninstalled then turned off windows update.
The Microsoft warship has fully turned – their new business model is mining your data to sell you their fremium services.
Better watch out for that new
Better watch out for that new OEM “OPTION” of not supplying the device’s UEFI/BIOS with any M$ windows secure BOOT [OFF] switch for PCs/Laptops that come with windows 10 factory installed, you may find yourself with hardware that is dependent on M$’s key signing athority in order to run your OS of choice on the hardware that you thought that you owned! There is no telling what M$ may add to the UEFI/BIOS to gather some unavoidable telemetry on you in the future!
What a bunch of tin foil hat
What a bunch of tin foil hat nonsense.
You realize every major tech
You realize every major tech website is talking about this right, not just rumormills? And that Microsoft’s aggressive data collection and telemetry is outlined in Microsoft’s own Privacy Policy? Go read it for yourself before you say something stupid and uninformed again.
Unless you’re an astroturfer for M$, then 10 cents have been deposited into your account.
The same accusation was made
The same accusation was made of people that said FIFA was a corrupt organisation, that the banks were gaming the system, and that people in the media and governments were kiddy fiddlers.
Go drink some Soylent and
Go drink some Soylent and enjoy being spied on “Anonymous”.
More Tin-Foil hat stuff.
More Tin-Foil hat stuff. Maybe someone should read what’s really going on by taking a look at Ed Bott’s deep-dive article on the so called privacy issues.
It’s just another example of people lining up to take a shot at Microsoft, but not having a single issue with the privacy things the tech darlings Apple and Google do.
Did MS run over someones Grandmother in the 90’s or something?
Have you maybe considered
Have you maybe considered that the same people angry at Windows telemetry are also pissed off at Google and Apple as well? I sure know I have. Why does M$ get a pass when people have been angry at the other companies spying despite Microsoft having a much larger userbase? Also that ZDnet article is pure unprofessional trash spewing ad-hominem to any dissenters. It reads like emotionally charged clickbait from Gawker or something. It doesn’t address any evidence aside from looking at the Privacy Policy, plugging their ears and closing their eyes at what’s right in front of them.
You mean Ed for M$ Bott, he’s
You mean Ed for M$ Bott, he’s the M$ bot that’s paid a lot!
He’s the big Monopoly’s apologist!
It’s Time to go All Steam OS and get an OS as gaming infrastructure, and not an OS that make makes the user a product to be monetized! Let’s make the OS an open standard like PCI and Vulkan, and be rid of all the cycles stealing Spyware and adware/bloatware that is M$’s windows 10! It’s better for gaming to do away with as much of the proprietary that is ruining the user’s ability to obtain control over their own hardware, and that starts with an open standards Gaming OS built on top of the Linux Kernel and streamlined for only the necessary OS functionality that does not get in the way of the user and their hardware.
It’s time to dump all of Redmond’s crapware, and bring the OS and our hardware under our control, and not be just another node in M$ cloud!
Everybody hated Ma Bell, Standard Oil, and everybody hates M$, there should be no love for Monopolies! Do you really enjoy the force-feeding and loss of control over your hardware!
Thank you for this comment.
Thank you for this comment.
Ed Bott is a Microshit shill.
Ed Bott is a Microshit shill.
Ed Bott is a Microshit shill.
Ed Bott is a Microshit shill.
You realize every major tech
You realize every major tech website is trolling for clickbait….thats the whole point of the tech blogs, higher eyeballs, more $$$ what better way to cash in on the fear mongering hordes of idiots… they’ll beat this drum till their arms fall off.
Again…. win 10 has been put on wireshark and watched.
Again this telemetry stuff is “Anonymous” and ehm, apple does the same thing!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! But its not cool to hate on apple.
Its still cool to MS bash though.
But the laptop/PC users can
But the laptop/PC users can avoid Apple, because Apple is not doing a big land grab over the Independent PC/Laptop OEM/OS market, Apple’s closed ecosystem is restricted to Apple’s own Branded Hardware. And WireShark can not see what is encrypted and sent, nor can WireShark see what happens in the UEFI/BIOS that may even be hidden from the OS, and VMs!
It’s M$ trying to control the Third party PC/Laptop OEM market and force an Apple Style closed ecosystem onto these indipendent OEM produced PC/Laptop users’ own hardware that is not manufactured M$. Talk about the dictionary definition of a violation of the Sherman antitrust act. This illegal monopolistic land grab over the third party Independent PC/Laptop market needs to be stopped! I do not buy my computer hardware from Apple, or M$, I buy may computer hardware from independent third party PC/laptop OEMs that are not supposed to be under the control of their OS parts supplier! Same goes for OEMs and their CPU/SOC parts supplier, this illegal monopolistic land grab from M$ needs to be halted!!!
People never liked M$, and M$ only got the business because at first M$ stayed out of the Users way and windows 7 is the last M$ OS that I will use. M$ needed to be broken up decades ago, and now it’s most definitely worse for the consumer that breakup still has not happened. These years of the windows Tax and independently produced PC/Laptop hardware forced to have any OS pre-installed, so much for the land of the free!
uh no duh wireshark can’t see
uh no duh wireshark can’t see whats in encrypted packets.
But it can see data moving..and when it says the OS is sending NOTHING to anyone anywhere…. its fixed.
but of course go back to your constant MS bash mode….its your hobby of choice.
and if you think linux is some safe secure fix all keep dreaming.
You can do a MITM by using
You can do a MITM by using stuff like an UTM. That does allow you to watch the encrypted data. It’s all about which certificates to trust, and if you tell your machine to trust the certificates issued by the UTM, it then does so.
People hate Monopolies,
People hate Monopolies, especially monopolies that are illegally using their broad horizontal market share(about 89% of the third party independent OEM PC/Laptop OS market is controlled by M$) to force a vertical market control over these very same independent PC/Laptop OEMs and by default the independent PC/Laptop OEM’s customers! It’s no wonder that Valve has taken to creating its own Linux based Gaming OS and open ecosystem, so that the entire gaming industry is not locked into M$’s monopoly land grab and M$’s demands for 30% of of the top for all the gaming business on the Independently produced OEM PC/laptop hardware, that will hopefully not be under any monopoly intrest’s control.
I thought the hordes of
I thought the hordes of idiots were the ones using Windows 10.
I still don’t get why this
I still don’t get why this concerns people outside businesses that deal in confidential information. Does Microsoft have some incentive to do something nefarious with this data or are they just using it to improve their software and services?
People have loads of
People have loads of confidential information, care to share you bank account number with the world, or other vital information. Bull crap to the “improve their software and services”, and more like sell your personal metrics to any and all with the cash, or to push more annoying ads into your computing experience. Please get a rain check on reality!
I sure as hell don’t want my doctor using windows 10, in fact windows 10 is a big HIPAA security lawsuit in the making if some doctor uses the non enterprise/HIPAA complaint version of windows 10. I do not even want my landlord using windows 10, that’s another lawsuit waiting to happen! And on and on, with the reasons not to be using 10, and M$ may find itself in a big legal black hole if it back-ports too much more to windows 7 of that telemetry gathering.
So you live in a house with
So you live in a house with open windows and no curtains and blinds then? Come on remc, lets see those credit card numbers and your bank account password/s. Nothing to hide nothing to fear right?
Thankfully we live in a
Thankfully we live in a country in which the court system enforces contracts as written and does not allow companies to breach their duty of care. Microsoft has my credit card numbers already, as I permit them to in accordance with the terms of service. They also, by way of Edge, have my bank account passwords, but are bound by a duty of confidentiality that I have full faith that they intend not to breach. Why would Microsoft soil their image by not standing by their contracts? Class action lawsuits are way too easy (and attorneys will pounce at the opportunity to sue a well insured corporation like Microsoft) to take such a risk.
Yeah no one does
Yeah no one does unconstitutional data collection at all!
Been living under a rock?
yesssssssssss they are just
yesssssssssss they are just using the data to improve software and services!!!!!!!
just like how google tracks every damn thing you search for, how do you think the search engines get good.. THEY WATCH
this doesn’t mean some guy is sitting outside your house in a phucking van watching you take a dump and check your mailbox.
You think MS is secretly collecting bank info and credit card numbers? yea thats it… MS is just going to max out everyones card one day steal a bunch of money and then hold a massive world wide press conference saying HA HA HA HA HAAAAAAAAAAAAAA, then steve balmer will grow horns and poof away in a cloud of red smoke.
You people are 10 levels past batsh*t stupid.
They dont need to be
They dont need to be collecting it for nefarious purposes.
Cybercriminals will just use Microsofts built in vulnerabilities(features) to exfiltrate user data.
GOD bless GOD – the Good Old
GOD bless GOD – the Good Old DOS. We miss you!
#uninstall windows
#uninstall windows updates.
#type in cmd as administrator:
1. powershell
#check upgrade to win 10 updates.
2. get-hotfix -id KB3035583,KB2952664,KB2976978,KB3021917
#check updates for spyware on win 7 and 8.
3. get-hotfix -id KB3068708,KB3022345,KB3075249,KB3080149
#exit powershell.
4 exit
#Use the command – wusa /uninstall /kb:####### – to uninstall a patch
#eg: wusa /uninstall /kb:2952664
Yeap, Microsoft is trying to
Yeap, Microsoft is trying to make Windows 7 to look as bad as Windows 10. This company is giving me every one or two weeks one more reason to be glad that I didn’t rush to throw my Windows 7 key out the Window, by turning it to a Windows 10 key.
“i7 2600K @ stable 5.2GHz
“i7 2600K @ stable 5.2GHz under Swiftech water + Windows 7 Ultimate x64 SP 1”-god here.
A-ckhem! *Cleans his throat* a-ckhem!
*Screams loudly in voice of Scorpion* SSSUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCKAAAAAAAAZZZZZ!!!11
Article based upon reading
Article based upon reading comprehension problems. Article is wrong and incorrect.
And commenters didn’t bother to check what reality is and thus are reacting to wrong information pushed by this article.
Here is link to KB of update:
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/3080149
Oh really?
Here I have a link
Oh really?
Here I have a link too
http://www.forbes.com/sites/gordonkelly/2015/08/30/windows-10-spying-on-windows-7-and-windows-8/
It’s tech journalism of
It’s tech journalism of today. Collect cheap points by not looking up facts.
Or … just possibly you are
Or … just possibly you are reading the comments and thinking what was said there is what I put in my post?
I bet all these fools have
I bet all these fools have chrome, android phones, gmail accounts, FB…etc etc etc etc.
Remember when google started reading your email and not deleting it when you say delete *zero fks given*
How about when chrome started sending all your keystrokes to google *zero*
So using your android phone with your google account on your home computer laptop anything.. oh yea you’ve got it good.
You can use ZERO microsoft products FOREVER, since 6 years AGO and you still are at tin foil hat level 10.
but they won’t talk about that.
linux? sure still using that ISP? tracked.
are you booting to linux and instantly jumping on a VPN, psh nsa is silently in most of them… TRACKED.
do you use a credit card or debt card… TRACKED.
but but but but… M$
go ahead, use ZERO microsoft products and services for the rest of your entire life….. unless you live like the unibomber.
TRACKED!
go ahead keep crying… don’t worry your android enabled phone has been logging your GPS data watching where you’ve been driving…storing your web history, emails……
someone could print out a day to day of what you do, where you go, and how you do it.
windows and microsoft removed. but nope linux is your cure all to this problem.
really guys, get bent. trolls.
Two wrongs don’t make a
Two wrongs don’t make a right.
Just because others are doing something doesn’t suddenly mean it’s acceptable to join them.
I can’t believe this is even
I can’t believe this is even news. Such a non-issue.
I wish PC per would step up
I wish PC per would step up and stop reblogging this tabloid style tech news.
tech blogs, news, sites are all troll tabloid trash. All slanted with a bias.
I like pc per cause we get no b/s facts.
lets stick to this guys… stop baiting trolls, let them stay at theregister and circle jerk each other.