Windows is now essentially a personalized, cloud-based operating system with the primary interface as a personal assistant, so I expected to see all these things as defaults. The advanced features just couldn't work without it. I'm glad there's at least an opt-out, but I do think that Windows needs an OS-wide incognito mode, just a simple switch to record or not record data.
I generally use that on my browser for when I hand my laptop to someone else and don't want their activity polluting my history, but now there's the risk of the entire OS learning someone else's habits when they just need to use the computer and don't want to log in. Sometimes, guest accounts are too restrictive.
I do like having the option of a personalized experience, and Microsoft is generally one of the most restrictive companies when it comes to sharing data. With their push toward more personal cloud services, I hope they will take special care to maintain that record, although everyone knows that certain groups like government have ways of getting whatever they want if it's available.
Hopefully, some of the fine-grained permissions of Windows Phone will soon carry over to the unified platform for those who want it, but either way, I would still do any especially sensitive work on Debian or a similar system.
"Windows is now essentially a personalized, cloud-based operating system with the primary interface as a personal assistant."
Who wanted that for desktop computers or laptops? This is not going to fly with business customers. Microsoft has already bombed twice in the business space, with Windows Vista and Windows 8. This looks like another bomb.
Windows 7 is still pretty good, and it will probably be the main Microsoft desktop OS for years to come, despite what Microsoft wants.
It's possible to do all this personalization without giving away your data to advertisers. Unfortunately Microsoft chose not to.
Why do people seem to gloss over the fact that we can implement these technologies without losing privacy? e.g. voice recognition has been possible on home computers for decades now. You don't need the cloud for it.
Yeah there should definitely be a "Hey Cortana, off the record,..." query mode.
I'm a bit conflicted now. My girls are 7 & 9 and they've been using Microsoft Accounts. With the final Win10 build having all this (none of these settings worked a few months ago), it looks like I've got a lot of reading and explaining to do for them.
but now there's the risk of the entire OS learning someone else's habits when they just need to use the computer
They already do pollute the OS history with their behaviours. Examples would be the DNS cache, the thumbnail database and the temp directory. Most people just don't know about these or look at them. But they can be very revealing. The problem I have is that the OS is so ready to upload things. I don't want my OS to upload anything at all, unless I command it to do so.
I've been waiting for this comment, I can see how the first set of customization options really seem like they'd help with the personal assistant. It would be interesting to get a full audit of where your data goes and what they can use it for (training your personal assistant, improving their algorithms, responding to Govt data requests, improving ads, etc).
As for incognito, can you sign into windows as guest now? Or even have multiple accounts on the same pc? If so you could create a guest/dummy account if you are interested in giving the personal assistant pure data.
What do you mean by that? Not only you can't set any access rights for applications (they get what they ask for and you can either accept all or not install the application), but the OS also synchronizes your main account's contacts and calendar to THE CLOUD without asking you, telling you, and even without a way to opt out of it.
> I do think that Windows needs an OS-wide incognito mode, just a simple switch to record or not record data.
Sounds like switching to a guest account. Not as quick as a simple "toggle data recording" button, but that functionality is definitely already in Windows.
It looks like Microsoft has installed the "back door" that FBI Director Comey wanted.[1][2] That may be the real motivation behind these "features". The "backing up" of the local drive encryption key to Microsoft servers is one of the things the FBI specifically asks for. Any press reading this, ask Microsoft what communications they've had with the FBI regarding backdoors.
I find it shocking how people readily accept Google's far worse policies, and yet are so concerned about an easy opt out.
For instance, in Android, Google tracks with GPS accuracy your whereabouts constantly. This isn't just what IP your desktop is attached to. Furthermore, there is no prompt telling you this happens with a very easy way of undoing. In fact even if you knew about this it is very hard to find a way to disable.
Secondly, Chrome send every website you visit to their servers to be logged. Again, this is not explained in some easy opt-out screen and in fact the only way to get around this is to use SRWare Iron, where they removed that code.
But Microsoft makes it easy for you to choose the privacy options even telling you about them on install.
I've never understood how people can truly believe that by checking (or unchecking) a checkbox their privacy will be fully protected. Especially since we're talking about a closed-source OS.
I mean I cannot possibly verify what exactly goes on in the annals of the operating system and what happens to my data, where it is logged and where it is stored and how it is sent.
So regardless of the settings, I always assume that my data is logged and read by some creepy agent in the Ministry of Truth.
If it's not, then I'm just lucky.
Having grown up in a totalitarian state, that's the default way I think about this stuff and no amount of promises (except the source code which I can personally compile) can make me trust any 3rd party corporation.
There is some risk but it's not high. Microsoft is a huge, rich company. If it leaked they were violating their own privacy policy that blatantly, there would be the mother of all class action lawsuits.
There would federal CFAA, Economic Espionage Act, etc., investigations plus antitrust abuse investigations.
"Send typing and inking data to Microsoft to improve the recognition and suggestion platform"
"Typing data" sounds like keylogging. If it's what it sounds like, that's really emphatically not okay; that would include all passwords and the contents of all emails sent.
Would someone with actual knowledge care to chime in and say what data is actually sent? If it turns out that Windows 10 really is sending keystrokes to Microsoft by default, it seems likely to cause a significant backlash from Microsoft's business and government customers.
Based on the wording, it sounds like it's autocomplete data — "I suggested this for what they typed or handwrote, but they chose this instead."
If so, it probably wouldn't include passwords (since password fields intentionally disable this kind of feature), and it shouldn't include the full contents of emails, just telemetry on how they were typed.
But Microsoft really ought to have explanations so we don't have to guess, and they ought to know that. I'm assuming this is on their itinerary and the documentation department is just lagging.
While it would be a little reassuring to find out what Windows 10 is currently sending, you should note that as the privacy agreement sounds like keylogging, Microsoft are claiming the right to start keylogging even if they don't quite do that now.
Also, enterprise editions of Windows apparently have more opt-outs... regular editions cannot opt out of all data collection. (sorry, can't find the page that I read this on)
IE and other browsers configured to use Bing have done this for a while. I discovered it while packet sniffing for something else and seeing HTTP requests for the things I was typing in the Address Bar.
I can't say I'm surprised, though saddened, to see this elsewhere in the OS.
It's important to remember that it doesn't matter what MS is doing today. What matters is what the force-updated version will do in the future. Or did everybody forget that you cannot prevent updates in this version?
I wager what that means is if you hand-write and then type the same text, Windows will/can send the typed & hand-written version to a server, where it can be used to improve the handwriting recognition, either for that specific user or for everybody everywhere.
The problem is there's no like "more info" icon you can click to get an explanation of what it means.
It's too bad that microsoft continues to be villainized when companies like Facebook and Google have social networks and browsers respectively that have similar practices that users are even more unaware of when they use them.
Computers these days have become thin clients for browsers (especially for the typical consumer). Except for the occasional open of Word or Excel, you're in your web browser browsing the web and have a tab open for Facebook. With new features like "sign into your browser" or ad retargeting across the sites you visit today, consumers are already being subjected to practices that Microsoft at least gives you the ability to turn off piecemeal if you so wish. They're just doing so at the operating system layer instead of the browser.
Think doing so at the operating system is more criminal than at the web browser or website level? Consider that Google Chrome is moving to become "Chromebooks" and that Android integrates Google Search. It's already happening and we take Google's "don't be evil" mantra for face value while continuing to poke Microsoft out of sheer habit.
Of course MS wants to get in on surveillance-as-a-business-model. It keeps people tied to your Service as a Software Substitute, and as long long as most people are still ignorant about how technology works, they won't notice how the stalker-like nature of a lot of modern soft^H^H^H^Hmalware.
As for the few nerds that notice, they can probably be shut up with an obscure option to disable (most of?) the data collection; the number of people that even know the option exists will be insignificant. Some of those nerds can even be distracted with promises of "open" access (to our proprietary APIs we can remove or change without notice); if you phrase it right, it can even sound like "open" is referring to the commons. After a while, some of them may even build entire businesses based on feeding user surveillance data upstream. After a generation, the days of being able to write client software will be long forgotten.
--
The ongoing Theft Of Privacy (and the closely related The War On General Purpose Computing) are being fought, and this brazen behavior by Microsoft to take advantage user ignorance is taking yet another step down a dark path.
Which side are you going to be on? The side that is trying to maintain the remains of our privacy, an open internet, and free computing?
The apathetic side that fixes technical problems for themselves, while everybody else gets spied upon a little bit more while their tools become even more removed from their control? I hope you enjoy the consequences of rewarding this kind of behavior. Why should Microsoft (or anybody else) change when they still get paid and maintain their user-count?
Or are you the apparatchik, who thinks Cortana (or Alexa, or Siri, ... or Google Analytics) is a useful, cool piece of software? Surely the Big Data being collected is just going to be used for the stated purposes and could never have a noxious effect on users or become an attractive target for hackers or governments? If you're in this category, you might just want to start paying attention to the larger games being played, because if you don't start fighting for your future others may take it from you.
I dont' know why so many people are surprised by the Cortana data vacuum. Doesn't Siri send everything you say to it to Apple or a "trusted partner"? Why would Cortana be any different?
The keylogger and Start menu ads are just creepy though. I shouldn't have to opt-out of targeted ads INSIDE MY OS.
There's also a difference in perception between Apple's "trusted partners" and MS and Google's "trusted partners". Since MS and Google make a large amount of money from selling you to others, I just instantly assume that they're sharing my data with advertisers. Since I pay for all my Apple stuff and they repeatedly say that they don't sell my data, I assume that "trusted partners" means companies they've outsourced speech recognition to, or whatever, and that it won't ever be used for tracking or advertising.
You've had targeted ads on your XBox homescreen for a long time; a core OS feature of the iPhone is the app store, which features targeted ads. When app discovery becomes a part of the OS, advertising seems to naturally follow.
To be fair, Apple needs that messaging for Siri because they outsource the speech recognition to a 3rd party (Nuance, I think). It's not like your phone is doing all of that legwork locally. I'll bet it's the same deal with Google Now and Cortana.
Of course you did. Large companies have no vested interest in building systems that do the "right thing" for you as defined by tech types like us who are arguably more sensitive on this subject than most people.
They are building services that take your information and try to do something interesting enough with it to make it worthwhile...and why is it on by default? Because they want to make money off of the new features and deep integration with your information.
This isn't news. But it certainly may be another excuse to have the exact same conversation that nothing will come from.
Never mind that data generated and collected from cell phone usage will always make the privacy impinging features of your laptop look tame in comparison.
Never mind that the only way to stop companies from doing this is through the political processes that everyone seems to have written off.
EDIT: Downvoting because someone disagrees with the principal argument of the post is lame. Cheers.
This goes along with the news that Windows 10 backs up your drive encryption key by default, and that Microsoft can use it to decrypt your data. In "good faith", of course.
Imagine if you discovered an exploit for TLS and just listened in on a public / hotel network to tons of Windows machines sending keystrokes, calendar, contacts, etc to Microsoft in the background... At least in the Windows 95 days you had to write the key logger yourself and get it installed somehow.
People want to be connected, join social networks, download apps, be able to control their appliances from across the ocean, carry devices loaded with sensors everywhere they go--and on top of all it, they want privacy.
I lost trust into Microsoft when they put an "Outlook" app into the Android app store, which when connected to an Exchange server downloads all the account messages and calendar data to a cloud server (probably in order to have push messages whithout changing Exchange itself).
Really Microsoft, why do you think I have an Exchange server. Because it is easy to set up, administer and costs nothing?
Wi-Fi Sense is a huge security hole, and even if you don't have windows 10, if anyone you trust with access to your network upgrades to windows 10, that person becomes a security problem for you.
Obvious solution is to use a strong generated string for your password (so even if they get your password, they're not getting the password to anything else), and then configure your router to require each device connecting to be authenticated. Whitelist for MAC addresses + GPG + ?
This might be the first time you'll need a firewall to protect yourself from internal attacks by the OS itself. I don't think I'll be updating to windows 10 any time soon.
Someone I know who has been in the cracking/warez scene for over 20 years, and did a lot of analysis on the XP activation scheme when it first came out, had this to say about Windows 10 and the trend in general:
Remember Gates said, about piracy "we'll somehow figure out how to collect sometime in the next decade"? It is happening now. And lots of other software/service are becoming "free" or massive discount, since selling your data is much more profit. Crack was about using software without paying money. Maybe in future it will be without paying with personal data or privacy. We will find a way, always. :-)
This is more of a rhetorical question, but why does every modern OS and browser need to try and become a computing leviathan? Why can't my hammer ever be happy just driving nails? I don't need a hammer that cooks waffles.
Windows 10 RTM has peer to peer updates over the internet as the default. I could swear it defaulted to local-only in the preview, so I didn't even check it until now after doing a clean install of RTM.
I don't intend on leaving any of these on when I install Windows 10 but some of these seem to correspond directly with the whole "Cortana as personal assistant" thing. And there is whole separate system for controlling what Cortana knows about you.
[+] [-] ewzimm|10 years ago|reply
I generally use that on my browser for when I hand my laptop to someone else and don't want their activity polluting my history, but now there's the risk of the entire OS learning someone else's habits when they just need to use the computer and don't want to log in. Sometimes, guest accounts are too restrictive.
I do like having the option of a personalized experience, and Microsoft is generally one of the most restrictive companies when it comes to sharing data. With their push toward more personal cloud services, I hope they will take special care to maintain that record, although everyone knows that certain groups like government have ways of getting whatever they want if it's available.
Hopefully, some of the fine-grained permissions of Windows Phone will soon carry over to the unified platform for those who want it, but either way, I would still do any especially sensitive work on Debian or a similar system.
[+] [-] Animats|10 years ago|reply
Who wanted that for desktop computers or laptops? This is not going to fly with business customers. Microsoft has already bombed twice in the business space, with Windows Vista and Windows 8. This looks like another bomb.
Windows 7 is still pretty good, and it will probably be the main Microsoft desktop OS for years to come, despite what Microsoft wants.
[+] [-] joosters|10 years ago|reply
Why do people seem to gloss over the fact that we can implement these technologies without losing privacy? e.g. voice recognition has been possible on home computers for decades now. You don't need the cloud for it.
[+] [-] MichaelGG|10 years ago|reply
I'm a bit conflicted now. My girls are 7 & 9 and they've been using Microsoft Accounts. With the final Win10 build having all this (none of these settings worked a few months ago), it looks like I've got a lot of reading and explaining to do for them.
[+] [-] Kenji|10 years ago|reply
They already do pollute the OS history with their behaviours. Examples would be the DNS cache, the thumbnail database and the temp directory. Most people just don't know about these or look at them. But they can be very revealing. The problem I have is that the OS is so ready to upload things. I don't want my OS to upload anything at all, unless I command it to do so.
[+] [-] vlunkr|10 years ago|reply
I don't know much about Windows 10, so I'm curious what features you are referring to that require heavy tracking like this.
[+] [-] bargl|10 years ago|reply
As for incognito, can you sign into windows as guest now? Or even have multiple accounts on the same pc? If so you could create a guest/dummy account if you are interested in giving the personal assistant pure data.
[+] [-] nsgoetz|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Aoyagi|10 years ago|reply
What do you mean by that? Not only you can't set any access rights for applications (they get what they ask for and you can either accept all or not install the application), but the OS also synchronizes your main account's contacts and calendar to THE CLOUD without asking you, telling you, and even without a way to opt out of it.
[+] [-] brownbat|10 years ago|reply
Great point...
Where's that utopian future where we bounce between a dozen purpose-built VMs, each customized to the task we're doing?
[+] [-] TimFogarty|10 years ago|reply
Sounds like switching to a guest account. Not as quick as a simple "toggle data recording" button, but that functionality is definitely already in Windows.
[+] [-] pbreit|10 years ago|reply
It would be fine if they were defaults if you actually saw them.
[+] [-] mattkrea|10 years ago|reply
Citation needed?
[+] [-] Animats|10 years ago|reply
[1] http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/jul/08/fbi-chief-... [2] http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2014/oct/16/fbi-director-...
[+] [-] alyx|10 years ago|reply
I have personally used the feature several times to recover my drive keys.
There's no evidence here that Microsoft has installed a "back door" for the FBI.
[+] [-] natmaster|10 years ago|reply
For instance, in Android, Google tracks with GPS accuracy your whereabouts constantly. This isn't just what IP your desktop is attached to. Furthermore, there is no prompt telling you this happens with a very easy way of undoing. In fact even if you knew about this it is very hard to find a way to disable.
Secondly, Chrome send every website you visit to their servers to be logged. Again, this is not explained in some easy opt-out screen and in fact the only way to get around this is to use SRWare Iron, where they removed that code.
But Microsoft makes it easy for you to choose the privacy options even telling you about them on install.
[+] [-] codeshaman|10 years ago|reply
I mean I cannot possibly verify what exactly goes on in the annals of the operating system and what happens to my data, where it is logged and where it is stored and how it is sent.
So regardless of the settings, I always assume that my data is logged and read by some creepy agent in the Ministry of Truth.
If it's not, then I'm just lucky.
Having grown up in a totalitarian state, that's the default way I think about this stuff and no amount of promises (except the source code which I can personally compile) can make me trust any 3rd party corporation.
[+] [-] KeytarHero|10 years ago|reply
You mean besides the fact that collecting personal data without your consent is illegal?
[+] [-] rhino369|10 years ago|reply
There would federal CFAA, Economic Espionage Act, etc., investigations plus antitrust abuse investigations.
[+] [-] nsns|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] emerongi|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jimrandomh|10 years ago|reply
"Typing data" sounds like keylogging. If it's what it sounds like, that's really emphatically not okay; that would include all passwords and the contents of all emails sent.
Would someone with actual knowledge care to chime in and say what data is actually sent? If it turns out that Windows 10 really is sending keystrokes to Microsoft by default, it seems likely to cause a significant backlash from Microsoft's business and government customers.
[+] [-] chc|10 years ago|reply
If so, it probably wouldn't include passwords (since password fields intentionally disable this kind of feature), and it shouldn't include the full contents of emails, just telemetry on how they were typed.
But Microsoft really ought to have explanations so we don't have to guess, and they ought to know that. I'm assuming this is on their itinerary and the documentation department is just lagging.
[+] [-] joosters|10 years ago|reply
Also, enterprise editions of Windows apparently have more opt-outs... regular editions cannot opt out of all data collection. (sorry, can't find the page that I read this on)
[+] [-] edwhitesell|10 years ago|reply
I can't say I'm surprised, though saddened, to see this elsewhere in the OS.
[+] [-] pdkl95|10 years ago|reply
It's important to remember that it doesn't matter what MS is doing today. What matters is what the force-updated version will do in the future. Or did everybody forget that you cannot prevent updates in this version?
[+] [-] differentView|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] blakeyrat|10 years ago|reply
The problem is there's no like "more info" icon you can click to get an explanation of what it means.
[+] [-] niyogi|10 years ago|reply
Computers these days have become thin clients for browsers (especially for the typical consumer). Except for the occasional open of Word or Excel, you're in your web browser browsing the web and have a tab open for Facebook. With new features like "sign into your browser" or ad retargeting across the sites you visit today, consumers are already being subjected to practices that Microsoft at least gives you the ability to turn off piecemeal if you so wish. They're just doing so at the operating system layer instead of the browser.
Think doing so at the operating system is more criminal than at the web browser or website level? Consider that Google Chrome is moving to become "Chromebooks" and that Android integrates Google Search. It's already happening and we take Google's "don't be evil" mantra for face value while continuing to poke Microsoft out of sheer habit.
[+] [-] pdkl95|10 years ago|reply
Of course MS wants to get in on surveillance-as-a-business-model. It keeps people tied to your Service as a Software Substitute, and as long long as most people are still ignorant about how technology works, they won't notice how the stalker-like nature of a lot of modern soft^H^H^H^Hmalware.
As for the few nerds that notice, they can probably be shut up with an obscure option to disable (most of?) the data collection; the number of people that even know the option exists will be insignificant. Some of those nerds can even be distracted with promises of "open" access (to our proprietary APIs we can remove or change without notice); if you phrase it right, it can even sound like "open" is referring to the commons. After a while, some of them may even build entire businesses based on feeding user surveillance data upstream. After a generation, the days of being able to write client software will be long forgotten.
--
The ongoing Theft Of Privacy (and the closely related The War On General Purpose Computing) are being fought, and this brazen behavior by Microsoft to take advantage user ignorance is taking yet another step down a dark path.
Which side are you going to be on? The side that is trying to maintain the remains of our privacy, an open internet, and free computing?
The apathetic side that fixes technical problems for themselves, while everybody else gets spied upon a little bit more while their tools become even more removed from their control? I hope you enjoy the consequences of rewarding this kind of behavior. Why should Microsoft (or anybody else) change when they still get paid and maintain their user-count?
Or are you the apparatchik, who thinks Cortana (or Alexa, or Siri, ... or Google Analytics) is a useful, cool piece of software? Surely the Big Data being collected is just going to be used for the stated purposes and could never have a noxious effect on users or become an attractive target for hackers or governments? If you're in this category, you might just want to start paying attention to the larger games being played, because if you don't start fighting for your future others may take it from you.
[+] [-] iambitjelly|10 years ago|reply
The keylogger and Start menu ads are just creepy though. I shouldn't have to opt-out of targeted ads INSIDE MY OS.
[+] [-] vitd|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jameshart|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] fuzzywalrus|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] legomylibro|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] chadzawistowski|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] zodPod|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] justwannasing|10 years ago|reply
Well, today is Thursday. That other stuff was from Tuesday. Tomorrow it will be something else about somebody else.
[+] [-] sudioStudio64|10 years ago|reply
They are building services that take your information and try to do something interesting enough with it to make it worthwhile...and why is it on by default? Because they want to make money off of the new features and deep integration with your information.
This isn't news. But it certainly may be another excuse to have the exact same conversation that nothing will come from.
Never mind that data generated and collected from cell phone usage will always make the privacy impinging features of your laptop look tame in comparison.
Never mind that the only way to stop companies from doing this is through the political processes that everyone seems to have written off.
EDIT: Downvoting because someone disagrees with the principal argument of the post is lame. Cheers.
[+] [-] JoshTriplett|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] omarforgotpwd|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] frogpelt|10 years ago|reply
These are fun and interesting times.
[+] [-] tobias3|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] djloche|10 years ago|reply
Obvious solution is to use a strong generated string for your password (so even if they get your password, they're not getting the password to anything else), and then configure your router to require each device connecting to be authenticated. Whitelist for MAC addresses + GPG + ?
[+] [-] contravariant|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] userbinator|10 years ago|reply
Remember Gates said, about piracy "we'll somehow figure out how to collect sometime in the next decade"? It is happening now. And lots of other software/service are becoming "free" or massive discount, since selling your data is much more profit. Crack was about using software without paying money. Maybe in future it will be without paying with personal data or privacy. We will find a way, always. :-)
[+] [-] debacle|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] lewisl9029|10 years ago|reply
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9973629
Windows 10 RTM has peer to peer updates over the internet as the default. I could swear it defaulted to local-only in the preview, so I didn't even check it until now after doing a clean install of RTM.
[+] [-] wvenable|10 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jarsin|10 years ago|reply