11 ms·

This whole article is just a description of this YouTube video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IT4vDfA_4NI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IT4vDfA_4NI This v

This whole article is just a description of this YouTube video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IT4vDfA_4NI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IT4vDfA_4NI This video is substance-less, they hooked up Wireshark, watched packets fly past, most of which were DNS lookups, then described domains as if that is meaningful in itself. Most of the traffic is generated by Windows 11 widgets[0], which I'd suggest disabling either way. Do I like what Microsoft is doing with Windows 11? Actually, no, I'm pretty unhappy with it. But I hate how lazy most of these critiques are. They do so much irrefutably bad stuff, this is the best you can come up with? [0] https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/stay-up-to-date-with-widgets-7ba79aaa-dac6-4687-b460-ad16a06be6e4 https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/stay-up-to-date-...

zamalek 4y ago
> then described domains as if that is meaningful in itself It would be one thing if it was all MSFT domains, but scorecardresearch.com is pretty terrifying from a data sovereignty perspective. > which I'd suggest disabling either way. This isn't alarming because of how it affects tech-savvy users, it's alarming because of how it affects average people.
- Someone1234 4y ago
  The widgets are a [bad] wrapper on bing.com. bing.com uses those analytics products. Yes, it should be disabled by default, just like a lot of unacceptable practices on Windows 11. Just don't need to shoot a video with Wireshark running and talk through DNS lookups to get to that critique.
  - mixmastamyk 4y ago
    The video was useful and informative.
  - pessimizer 4y ago
    > Just don't need to shoot a video with Wireshark running and talk through DNS lookups to get to that critique. Or, you could do that. Why shouldn't that be done again?
    - Xeamek 4y ago
      Probably because the only reason why you would do that is to bait Clicks and confuse non-tech people? Nobody would care to make news out of it if all you said was "windows is basically doing the same thing google does, or any of the most popular websites for that matter"
      - ShroudedNight 4y ago
        Popular websites don't get to co-opt my computing device before I am able to establish policies about what behaviour I find acceptable.
      - CamperBob2 4y ago
        Google doesn't run my computer.
      - UncleEntity 4y ago
        I would care… I honestly don’t believe that an OS should go poking around the internet at all without doing something I specifically told it to. I’m currently upset with fedora because I can’t figure out how to turn off the automatic update feature, honestly I haven’t tried too hard, and all that is doing is connecting to servers that I would do anyways just on my own timeframe. If it started sending out every detail of my computing sessions, like TFA is claiming and you are defending, it would be off my computer as fast as I could download another distribution. I deal with google’s shenanigans with using chrome but that’s my choice, I downloaded the repo data, approved the signing keys and installed it manually.
- moose_man 4y ago
  Tech community treats Microsoft since Balmer with kids gloves, like it's some sort of non-profit organization for saving the planet.
  - ChuckNorris89 4y ago
    Where do you come up with this information? Just look at the weekly anti-Microsoft articles around here, including this one you're commenting on.
    - wrldos 4y ago
      This place can be quite bipolar. I actually quit HN for a long period over the "second coming of Microsoft" when the entire HN crowd was crowing of Satya's ascent into grand hegemon position because the sycophantry was making me wretch. My comments about the same old Microsoft were downvoted to oblivion and any dissident voices squashed. The US tech community spoke and would not listen to warnings. And here we are, back at ground zero.
  - Jenk 4y ago
    From my perspective it's the younger (and/or less mature) tech community that do this, and even then that's just sychophancy posts on reddit or elsewhere about how amazing C# is and you're a dumb-dumb for using anything that isn't C# etc. Those of us with longer teeth treat MS just the same as any org: We don't trust a single one of them.
    - JohnFen 4y ago
      The young whippersnappers will learn with experience.
    - wrldos 4y ago
      I think you're right on the mark there. I'm jaded and cynical enough to know what's going to hurt me and what's going to pay the bills and that's where my interest stops. 20 years of C# and 35 years of Unix now :( Worshipping any vendor is quite frankly a bit sad. I tend to avoid having to solve problems now. If I do it tends to go somewhere vendor neutral like python on whatever platform happens to be lying around and not annoying me at the time.
- anthk 4y ago
  get https://github.com/stevenblack/hosts
  - klipklop 4y ago
    There are components of windows that completely bypass the hosts file so it can 'phone home'.
  - Vortigaunt 4y ago
    Sadly this no longer works for Microsoft domains. Had Windows Defender mark my host file as having a 'severe' issue just because I copy pasted a list of Microsoft telemetry domains (1). Everything worked perfectly fine before that update. (1) https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/microsoft/windows-10-hosts-file-blocking-telemetry-is-now-flagged-as-a-risk/ https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/microsoft/windows-10-h...
    - hiccuphippo 4y ago
      I use DNSCrypt (SimpleDNSCrypt in Windows). It has extra features like wildcards for blocking subdomains. It doesn't touch your hosts file so it should bypass that.
    - justsomehnguy 4y ago
      Unbound works fine in Windows.
- torginus 4y ago
  Taking the risk of (fairly) being accused of whataboutism - I'm not sure what the alternatives are - Macs are just as brazenly collect date about you in the background to the point that like in Windows, the data collection bogs down the computer so that the user experience suffers noticeably. I'm also fairly certain even vanilla Android is a privacy nightmare, and when you add in the preinstalled vendor trash, it becomes 1000x worse. The only option that exists right now afaik is Linux, and in my experience daily driving Linux on a production/development machine is a nightmare.
photoGrant 4y ago
Let's say I'm a politician at a restaurant. I just want to eat. But even without opening the menu, you've had the chef call every person in town to let them know you're here. It's just, gross.
- naikrovek 4y ago
  That's not what's happening. that's not even a good analogy. A better analogy would be this: let's say I'm a politician at a restaurant. I just want to eat. But, without even opening the menu, the waiter needs to know that I'm there so they can bring the menu to me and greet me. They also bring water in case I am thirsty right now. BY FAR (if not entirely) this is what Windows does. Do you need updates? Are you an Autopilot machine used in the enterprise? Do any of your installed applications need updates from the Windows Store? These are all normal things, but people who don't understand how Windows handles these things consider them all spyware. None of them seem to be aware that you can install a telemetry viewer application and see everything sent to Microsoft from your PC if you're so concerned with what is being collected. You can also, from that application, delete the stuff Microsoft has collected about you from that machine. They go straight to "oh I can get views if I complain about Microsoft and sound very offended by it!" So, that's what they do. It's just annoying.
  - joeframbach 4y ago
    Which actor in your analogy is scorecardresearch.com?
    - pessimizer 4y ago
      The hidden camera in the waiter's tie.
    - nightski 4y ago
      Do we know that request originated from the OS and not some other app the user had installed?
      - 4y ago
ethbr0 4y ago
> Windows 11 widgets[0], which I'd suggest disabling either way. In case you were curious, apparently the full widget removal is via group policy. gpedit.msc > Computer Configuration > Administrative Templates > Windows Components > Widgets > Allow Widgets > {select Disabled} > {restart} https://www.pdq.com/blog/how-to-remove-widgets-in-windows-11/ https://www.pdq.com/blog/how-to-remove-widgets-in-windows-11...
- Someone1234 4y ago
  Per your own link, they can be disabled via Settings > Personalization > Taskbar > Widgets. All setting Local Policies does is force them off and stops the user from re-enabling them in the Settings (which is likely a good default for organizations).
  - offsquares 4y ago
    You set the group policy or Microsoft will reenable it on the next update (which is not what the user wants).
    - Espressosaurus 4y ago
      Group policy isn't a guarantee either since at some point they can just stop respecting it. I watched this happen with telemetry in Windows 7. You used to be able to opt out of everything at one point in time. Now you need a Microsoft account to register even non-365 versions of Office.
      - ethbr0 4y ago
        My general experience has been settings < registry << group policy. Microsoft will update settings in an update at a PM's whim. They may break registry key bindings due to code changes. But they generally don't break gpo functionality, because this causes issues for $$$ enterprise customers. Downside: Believe they cut group policy functionality in <Pro OS versions.
mixmastamyk 4y ago
Is this middlebrow dismissal really the top comment for an important discussion? Do you really believe the geolocator and marketing pings you didn't ask for are just to say hello and immediately forgotten?
- theknocker 4y ago
  [dead]
ormax3 4y ago
It should be possible to disable many of these connections as documented here: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/privacy/manage-connections-from-windows-operating-system-components-to-microsoft-services https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/privacy/manage-con...
- autoexec 4y ago
  This is good info, but damn is it obnoxious that you'd have to do all of that to keep just some of the spying at bay
kitkat_new 4y ago
is it possible to disable them?
amatecha 4y ago
Yeh, I was skeptical of your comment but I checked the article and video and they are utterly pointless. No substantiation that any 3rd party is actually contacted (other than your ISP for resolving DNS). It would have taken literally seconds to demonstrate actual connections being made. For all I know, this is clickbait/misinformation - the author(s) made it impossible for me to know otherwise.
ChuckMcM 4y ago
I remember when connecting Windows XP to the Internet resulted in a compromised system in < 90 seconds. That said, I agree it is a shallow look at things, I do bring up Windows machines on a network that white lists windows update servers and denies everything else. Yes it complains "The internet is unreliable" (not going to lie, it isn't Microsoft :-)).
mrmuagi 4y ago
DNS lookups are themselves alarming no? Why would you resolve a hostname and not, like, use that IP for something? Maybe some argument of pre-emptive hostname resolution but even in Ubunutu you can turn off the chatty background OS DNS resolutions.
npteljes 4y ago
I agree with you. I like it when people rip the thing to shreds for valid reasons, like this article: https://itvision.altervista.org/why-windows-11-sucks.html https://itvision.altervista.org/why-windows-11-sucks.html Excellent articles on Linux and other systems too, by the way, if you have the time.

zamalek 4y ago

> then described domains as if that is meaningful in itself It would be one thing if it was all MSFT domains, but scorecardresearch.com is pretty terrifying from a data sovereignty perspective. > which I'd suggest disabling either way. This isn't alarming because of how it affects tech-savvy users, it's alarming because of how it affects average people.

Someone1234 4y ago
The widgets are a [bad] wrapper on bing.com. bing.com uses those analytics products. Yes, it should be disabled by default, just like a lot of unacceptable practices on Windows 11. Just don't need to shoot a video with Wireshark running and talk through DNS lookups to get to that critique.
- mixmastamyk 4y ago
  The video was useful and informative.
- pessimizer 4y ago
  > Just don't need to shoot a video with Wireshark running and talk through DNS lookups to get to that critique. Or, you could do that. Why shouldn't that be done again?
  - Xeamek 4y ago
    Probably because the only reason why you would do that is to bait Clicks and confuse non-tech people? Nobody would care to make news out of it if all you said was "windows is basically doing the same thing google does, or any of the most popular websites for that matter"
    - ShroudedNight 4y ago
      Popular websites don't get to co-opt my computing device before I am able to establish policies about what behaviour I find acceptable.
    - CamperBob2 4y ago
      Google doesn't run my computer.
    - UncleEntity 4y ago
      I would care… I honestly don’t believe that an OS should go poking around the internet at all without doing something I specifically told it to. I’m currently upset with fedora because I can’t figure out how to turn off the automatic update feature, honestly I haven’t tried too hard, and all that is doing is connecting to servers that I would do anyways just on my own timeframe. If it started sending out every detail of my computing sessions, like TFA is claiming and you are defending, it would be off my computer as fast as I could download another distribution. I deal with google’s shenanigans with using chrome but that’s my choice, I downloaded the repo data, approved the signing keys and installed it manually.
moose_man 4y ago
Tech community treats Microsoft since Balmer with kids gloves, like it's some sort of non-profit organization for saving the planet.
- ChuckNorris89 4y ago
  Where do you come up with this information? Just look at the weekly anti-Microsoft articles around here, including this one you're commenting on.
  - wrldos 4y ago
    This place can be quite bipolar. I actually quit HN for a long period over the "second coming of Microsoft" when the entire HN crowd was crowing of Satya's ascent into grand hegemon position because the sycophantry was making me wretch. My comments about the same old Microsoft were downvoted to oblivion and any dissident voices squashed. The US tech community spoke and would not listen to warnings. And here we are, back at ground zero.
- Jenk 4y ago
  From my perspective it's the younger (and/or less mature) tech community that do this, and even then that's just sychophancy posts on reddit or elsewhere about how amazing C# is and you're a dumb-dumb for using anything that isn't C# etc. Those of us with longer teeth treat MS just the same as any org: We don't trust a single one of them.
  - JohnFen 4y ago
    The young whippersnappers will learn with experience.
  - wrldos 4y ago
    I think you're right on the mark there. I'm jaded and cynical enough to know what's going to hurt me and what's going to pay the bills and that's where my interest stops. 20 years of C# and 35 years of Unix now :( Worshipping any vendor is quite frankly a bit sad. I tend to avoid having to solve problems now. If I do it tends to go somewhere vendor neutral like python on whatever platform happens to be lying around and not annoying me at the time.
anthk 4y ago
get https://github.com/stevenblack/hosts
- klipklop 4y ago
  There are components of windows that completely bypass the hosts file so it can 'phone home'.
- Vortigaunt 4y ago
  Sadly this no longer works for Microsoft domains. Had Windows Defender mark my host file as having a 'severe' issue just because I copy pasted a list of Microsoft telemetry domains (1). Everything worked perfectly fine before that update. (1) https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/microsoft/windows-10-hosts-file-blocking-telemetry-is-now-flagged-as-a-risk/ https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/microsoft/windows-10-h...
  - hiccuphippo 4y ago
    I use DNSCrypt (SimpleDNSCrypt in Windows). It has extra features like wildcards for blocking subdomains. It doesn't touch your hosts file so it should bypass that.
  - justsomehnguy 4y ago
    Unbound works fine in Windows.
torginus 4y ago
Taking the risk of (fairly) being accused of whataboutism - I'm not sure what the alternatives are - Macs are just as brazenly collect date about you in the background to the point that like in Windows, the data collection bogs down the computer so that the user experience suffers noticeably. I'm also fairly certain even vanilla Android is a privacy nightmare, and when you add in the preinstalled vendor trash, it becomes 1000x worse. The only option that exists right now afaik is Linux, and in my experience daily driving Linux on a production/development machine is a nightmare.

photoGrant 4y ago

Let's say I'm a politician at a restaurant. I just want to eat. But even without opening the menu, you've had the chef call every person in town to let them know you're here. It's just, gross.

naikrovek 4y ago
That's not what's happening. that's not even a good analogy. A better analogy would be this: let's say I'm a politician at a restaurant. I just want to eat. But, without even opening the menu, the waiter needs to know that I'm there so they can bring the menu to me and greet me. They also bring water in case I am thirsty right now. BY FAR (if not entirely) this is what Windows does. Do you need updates? Are you an Autopilot machine used in the enterprise? Do any of your installed applications need updates from the Windows Store? These are all normal things, but people who don't understand how Windows handles these things consider them all spyware. None of them seem to be aware that you can install a telemetry viewer application and see everything sent to Microsoft from your PC if you're so concerned with what is being collected. You can also, from that application, delete the stuff Microsoft has collected about you from that machine. They go straight to "oh I can get views if I complain about Microsoft and sound very offended by it!" So, that's what they do. It's just annoying.
- joeframbach 4y ago
  Which actor in your analogy is scorecardresearch.com?
  - pessimizer 4y ago
    The hidden camera in the waiter's tie.
  - nightski 4y ago
    Do we know that request originated from the OS and not some other app the user had installed?
    - 4y ago

ethbr0 4y ago

> Windows 11 widgets[0], which I'd suggest disabling either way. In case you were curious, apparently the full widget removal is via group policy. gpedit.msc > Computer Configuration > Administrative Templates > Windows Components > Widgets > Allow Widgets > {select Disabled} > {restart} https://www.pdq.com/blog/how-to-remove-widgets-in-windows-11/ https://www.pdq.com/blog/how-to-remove-widgets-in-windows-11...

Someone1234 4y ago
Per your own link, they can be disabled via Settings > Personalization > Taskbar > Widgets. All setting Local Policies does is force them off and stops the user from re-enabling them in the Settings (which is likely a good default for organizations).
- offsquares 4y ago
  You set the group policy or Microsoft will reenable it on the next update (which is not what the user wants).
  - Espressosaurus 4y ago
    Group policy isn't a guarantee either since at some point they can just stop respecting it. I watched this happen with telemetry in Windows 7. You used to be able to opt out of everything at one point in time. Now you need a Microsoft account to register even non-365 versions of Office.
    - ethbr0 4y ago
      My general experience has been settings < registry << group policy. Microsoft will update settings in an update at a PM's whim. They may break registry key bindings due to code changes. But they generally don't break gpo functionality, because this causes issues for $$$ enterprise customers. Downside: Believe they cut group policy functionality in <Pro OS versions.

mixmastamyk 4y ago

Is this middlebrow dismissal really the top comment for an important discussion? Do you really believe the geolocator and marketing pings you didn't ask for are just to say hello and immediately forgotten?

theknocker 4y ago
[dead]

ormax3 4y ago

It should be possible to disable many of these connections as documented here: https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/privacy/manage-connections-from-windows-operating-system-components-to-microsoft-services https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/privacy/manage-con...

autoexec 4y ago
This is good info, but damn is it obnoxious that you'd have to do all of that to keep just some of the spying at bay

kitkat_new 4y ago

is it possible to disable them?

amatecha 4y ago

Yeh, I was skeptical of your comment but I checked the article and video and they are utterly pointless. No substantiation that any 3rd party is actually contacted (other than your ISP for resolving DNS). It would have taken literally seconds to demonstrate actual connections being made. For all I know, this is clickbait/misinformation - the author(s) made it impossible for me to know otherwise.

ChuckMcM 4y ago

I remember when connecting Windows XP to the Internet resulted in a compromised system in < 90 seconds. That said, I agree it is a shallow look at things, I do bring up Windows machines on a network that white lists windows update servers and denies everything else. Yes it complains "The internet is unreliable" (not going to lie, it isn't Microsoft :-)).

mrmuagi 4y ago

DNS lookups are themselves alarming no? Why would you resolve a hostname and not, like, use that IP for something? Maybe some argument of pre-emptive hostname resolution but even in Ubunutu you can turn off the chatty background OS DNS resolutions.

npteljes 4y ago

I agree with you. I like it when people rip the thing to shreds for valid reasons, like this article: https://itvision.altervista.org/why-windows-11-sucks.html https://itvision.altervista.org/why-windows-11-sucks.html Excellent articles on Linux and other systems too, by the way, if you have the time.