Microsoft updating Windows 7 and 8 to be as intrusive as Windows 10
RDL2004
Posts: 2,554
Not to be alarmist or anything, but it has been reported that Microsoft is "updating" Windows 7 and 8 to the same level of spying information gathering capability as Windows 10.
Of course, these days one person's definition of spying information gathering is another one's "you can't avoid it, it's just the way it is".
I generally only allow "Security" updates, but Microsoft has a history of arrogant and deceitful action and can no longer be trusted. For the time being, I've disabled Windows Update until I can verify what Microsoft is actually up to, and I've installed versions of Linux based operating systems on two different machines for testing and evaluation.
You may want to google this phrase or something similar:
microsoft updating windows 7 to spy
or you may not care. To each, their own.
Of course, these days one person's definition of spying information gathering is another one's "you can't avoid it, it's just the way it is".
I generally only allow "Security" updates, but Microsoft has a history of arrogant and deceitful action and can no longer be trusted. For the time being, I've disabled Windows Update until I can verify what Microsoft is actually up to, and I've installed versions of Linux based operating systems on two different machines for testing and evaluation.
You may want to google this phrase or something similar:
microsoft updating windows 7 to spy
or you may not care. To each, their own.
Comments
Yep, just saw a similar post on /. which goes into detail on the relevent KB's.
I'll check my primary work machine, which is locked down via User Policy, however when I get the old 6-core desktop up next month, I think I'll have to make it a new install with dual-boot to TinyCore or Mint maybe.
Maybe get another Rpi to use as a simple firewall upstream too, or an ASA or SRX.
In the process, I decided to remove Google Chrome from the browser selection and Google Toolbar from the Internet Explorer.
Google refuses to allow removal without completely filling out a two page market survey of why you desire to remove. No option for not participating.
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So it seems that everywhere one turns, we are all getting pushed to offer more information than we feel comfortable with.
I suppose the best approach is to have a 'neutral and safe identity' that you consistently offer to those that insist.
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I have no solution with how to adequately manage OS updates of any kind. But I tend to believe that there are some necessary reasons to update. There has long been a counter-culture that endorses no updates or a bare minimum of updates to MS products.
I must admit that I did activate and update my Windows7 and Windows Vista, but now I read this and wonder why I bothered. I generally don't use them as all the computers are dual boot with an open source alternative. On the Windows7, I ended up with a Windows10 promotional icon that annoys me.
And of course, Android on the cellular phone is part of the crowd on endless and invasive update processes. Every few days, I am getting something that I can't determine any true need or use.
Updates have simply become an avenue for adware by the OS originator. It seems that only Linux is trying to keep updates to addressing only performance, but even some distributions of Linux have strayed a bit as they attempt to create a brand identity for themselves.
Seriously? You actually allowed Internet Explorer to run? And it has a "Google Toolbar" !!!
I am...without words.
One thing (hint,hint), it's best if you don't allow google to tell you what you can do.
Just to give you an idea of my actual Windows usage, prior to my recent booting -- it seemed that the Vista hadn't seen any activity since 2012. Not much to spy on it the OS only gets booted about once in three years.
It's like locking your doors to stop a thief running out with your stuff. I'd rather not have the thieves in my house to start with.
Awesome that you have joined this discussion! Are you the same Roy Eltham that <removed by moderator>? Can you elaborate on your opinion that Microsoft is sending us "bs" by way of Windows Update?
The item in particular, " Are you the same Roy Eltham that <removed by moderator>?". So my turn for innuendo, RDL2004 may be doing some spying or information gathering of his own. People beware there are spies among us.
Ray
Please respect members right to privacy!
Only Roy (in this instance) should be deciding on what of his private information makes public domain!
Rather apt in context to this thread perhaps, but not fair !
Please be thoughtful towards your fellow forumistas !
BTW... You always have the option to ask such questions by PM.
Somehow your brief summary of this thread just hit the spot.... Can't stop chuckling!
Goodness gracious.. Are those visions of Loopy and yourself donning tin foil hats and sitting inside disused water towers to try off-grid world-wide comms really real ?
Must be time for me to switch off and go get some fresh air and exercise!!
Ignore any such all clear notifications, it may be bogus.
Heck. After three weeks hiding deep in the forest I was just about recovered from a severe bout of paranoia. Now Ray has set me back to square one.
For God sake don't go outside for that fresh air. There's cameras everywhere out there watching you.
Heater recently absconded to a remote shack near Russia, on the Finland border. Being some 833 miles long, he could be hard to locate. Scandinavians go to the outdoors in the mid-summer.
And I sit here in my tiny concrete bunker of a room with the dog sleeping under the bed while the air conditioner drones and typhoons come and go from an Asian metropolis of some 1.2 million with my phone listed under Chinese characters.
No need for disused water towers. When Russia invades Finland and China invades Taiwan at the same time, it will be too late for tin foil hats.
I just desire an OS that doesn't shriek 'look at me, buy something' and then turns around as refuses to let me turn the computer off when I need to go somewhere with the computer or refuses to let me in when I desire to get something of importance immediately done.
Nothing is more annoying to a boss than a slovenly worker that always tells him, "Hang on a second." I simply like to feel that I am master of my own fate and in control. I am the boss, my computer is my slave.
I feel like an old woman crying "MS took the best years of my life." I should have held back.
When the paradigm shifted from customers to consumers, we all became much abused.. no longer wooed for honest companionship. These days, the TV spouts that the USA is 'the greatest consumer nation' in the world. And I feel down-hearted. There are so many other avenues to greatness that have more cache with me.
My router is fine. An Asus wifi unit with Oleg-the-Russian's custom LInux firmware to confound the gnomes and dark forces.
These updates most likely just made the older Win7/8 stuff compatible with the backend changes made on MS's servers for Win10.
Yes, Win10 has more data collection mechanisms (mostly to provide more features to the OS), and it's a bit more work to turn them off, but it's not as terrible as everyone is making it out to be.
Roy
p.s. I wish I had seen what RDL had posted about me that was removed.
Also I expect that such action would be an opportunity for China to take most of Russia, whilst they are not looking. Thus undoing the work of Ivan The Terrible.
Everybody here is waiting for the action!
There is of course the resort to nuclear mayhem. But then nobody wins.
When you google search my name you get mostly information about me, since my name is pretty darn rare. There is one other Roy Eltham in the world that I know of (mostly from searching family tree stuff) and he lives in the UK, and is probably distantly related.
Well if @Heater is really 833 miles long he should be easy to locate...
Enjoy!
Mike
You guys should know this! It's all about the Faraday cage needing to envelope the entire subject.
It's Tin Foil Suits you should be manufacturing, High quality ones, with the nice Fleece lining inside...
-Tommy
I have been pondering where the whole 'consumer economy' concept came from and I suspect the gnomes of Wall Street fabricated this idea to justify a booming stock market with stagnant job growth. The new society frees us to perpetually shop and play computer games.
Way back in the late 1960s and early 1970s they similarly attempted to convince the world that a new 'recreational economy' was evolving we all needed to invest in bowling alley equipment.... Brunswick was the way of the future. I am getting a similar vibe from robots this and robots that... even though robots are an endless amusement to me.
What the world needs is to well-balanced between work and play, effort and rest... not all of one and none of the other. Oops... I appear to be off-topic, but it was a clarification to my previous grumbles about the 'consumer economy'.
I actually believe that the computer can be a wonderful business machine for the small businessman as it frees one from being keeper of reams of paperwork, ended the tyranny of sums on a 10-key adding machine, and allows one to be out of the office yet in the office at the same time.
I just needed to get beyond all the sales pressure that an proprietary OS brings to use of the generic tool. Nobody can get anything done when an aggressive salesmen descends on their domain demanding to be heard.
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My own concerns for privacy are simple. I am not a citizen of where I reside. I have no real rights, just privileges granted to a resident alien. The Foreign Affairs police could appear and just demand I leave without much explanation.
It is an interesting lifestyle. It has made me realize how worthless most of my opinions really are.
Well, I need get up to speed on firewalls, etc so I can bill more, so a RPi 2 F/W with Wireshark is sort of needed anyways....
Even if MS does an about face, I think Linux/BSD is going to be my new OS, with a fall back to Win7 on a VM for the few must haves that won't Wine well.
MS has actually pushed me kicking and screaming away from giving them money!
That might be the most reasonable way to learn to firewall in Linux. Everything behind the firewall can still be Windows, OSx, or a combination of whatever.