In Windows 10 when I go to Settings -> Privacy, I have 15 categories there, each of which has switches within it. I counted 61 such switches on my new Dell laptop with the Home version.
I will agree with the need to send diagnostic info to MS about crashes and problems. That's 1 category out of the 61 total. But why oh why do they need to know about the other categories? They want to snoop my microphone, camera, contacts, calendar, email, etc., etc. Heck, the Background apps alone has 16 such subcategories.
More questions. Why do they do this by default with minimal, if any, notice? Yes I can turn all these things off if I wish, but how many folks know about them in the first place? And even if you do know about them, why do they turn many of them back on after updates? And if you have the Home version, you can't control which updates you install, they just force them on you -- why? What does all this snooping do to help me? Other companies have surveys that you either volunteer for, or they pay some company in the survey business to conduct, but MS just does all this in a most sneaky fashion. Why?
I'm sure they're using some of this for future product development or enhancement, and companies can be very guarded about what they're doing in this regard I know. But they don't have to say WHAT they're developing or improving, they just need to give us a reason for all this. And yes I've read Ed Bott's editorial on this subject.
Now let's just say their motives are pure as the driven snow for sake of argument. What's to keep a disgruntled employee from copying and selling the contents of this database to some nefarious outfit? Or what's to keep the government from deciding they want access to all this data? It seems to me that based on what we know right now that the exposures far outweigh any possible benefits. I simply fail to understand what possible benefit to me that snooping in these 60 areas has.
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Windows 10 privacy - why so many "snoops".
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I did tackle the adverts that some say they see and here I'm not seeing it. My new Dell and Lenovo at the office did have custom home pages with Dell and Lenovo adverts so home page settings are well, how do you classify adverts like that?
Are you running into folk that get upset at adverts that are a bit more work than commercial TV to get rid of? I mean on the TV I change the channel or move to a streamer box. On the PC I set the home page, search engine and it cleared right up.
-> Many are calling the crash data collection an invasion of privacy. As a software author such has been a godsend to figure out why it crashed. Those that want privacy really need to run another OS. Even I keep a TAILS OS boot USB stick around.
And don't think for a moment that Linux is the answer. Just last week I installed Ubuntu and the defaults did get yahoo's adverts.
====+++++>>> 61 areas is too big to dive into. Pick one to focus on for a moment.
...abounds. Why can't MS just TELL us? Since they haven't, it's easy to be suspicious. OK, you say pick one for starters, so let's start at the top with the General category. Notice they say "let apps use my advertising ID" and "manage my MS advertising and other personalization info" for starters.
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Most folks aren't going to analyze these one by one, they just see the plethora of 61 "snoops" and get very leery of all this. Lack of being informed by MS leads many to be suspicious, me included. I'll go a bit further and say this is human nature. If there's nothing to worry about, why aren't they telling us? I understand that companies want to keep products under development secret, but they could give some general hints as to why.
" "let apps use my advertising ID" and "manage my MS advertising and other personalization info" "
The thing is that no apps are required to obey that setting. It's not a strict OS. That is, if I write an app it does not have to obey that setting.
Maybe the days of the PC are ending as folk want an OS and apps that control permissions at the same granularity or finer than Android?
So, no. Just no. It's a PC with all the openness of the wild wild west.
Post was last edited on January 4, 2016 1:30 PM PST
"It's a PC with all the openness of the wild wild west." Agreed, but why does MS need to collect that? What are they going to do with it? If I use an app from somebody I don't know, I'm certainly taking a risk, but these MS apps are built into Windows.
But on to the next one, Cameras. This one has 7 sub-snoops. Obviously most folks would want Skype to use it, but why do they need to collect pictures of me and store them in a database? We might as well throw microphones in here as well. I don't want MS collecting my pictures and voice and putting it in a database.
You make a point that privacy is essentially dead, and that's certainly more true now than ever. I just don't know why MS needs to snoop into these things without a good explanation, so I go out of my way to turn ALL these things off. I know a whole lot of folks who feel the same way. And I'll just add that's why a lot of folks don't go to Windows 10. Methinks MS is shooting themselves in the foot with all this "snoopware".
If we're just shrug and say there's no more privacy, why do we still use passwords, firewalls, and encryption? We certainly don't want to make it easy for snoopers, do we?
Here I'll stay away from conjecture. I do know that most folk want a more stable windows so the best way is to instrument it to send home crash and performance reports. Just like cars do today.
Since there is no system wide setting, the PC and Windows OS design is going to have 61 settings for 61 apps. It's the design from say 1995 and it hasn't changed much.
Maybe you would like how Android did this?
Not if you use Linux distros. You can make it as tight as you want.
If I create an account etc. Right out of the gate you see the same idea about adverts and data collection that we have to decide if we want or not.
Since this is part of the stock Ubuntu install, do I differentiate apps from OS behavior when the app is supplied with the OS?
everyone in linuxland who wants to avoid the snooping avoids that one. I don't think the MATE desktop with Ubuntu does that, but why not use Mint MATE instead if that's what one wants and avoid the possibility?
I'll post my trials of top 10 distros on (no spoilers here.)
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