
Microsoft sued over Windows 10 update campaign - rshx
http://www.seattletimes.com/business/microsoft/microsoft-sued-over-windows-10-update-campaign/
======
kctess5
What I find most appalling about Windows 10 is the draconian "default install"
options. Seriously, how did having a key logger as the default option get
through privacy review? Also desktop ad tracking?

I said no to three solid screens full of what I consider to be highly privacy
infringing settings on install, all of which were on by default if you didn't
do a "custom install."

~~~
Esau
If the default settings are for user information to be shared, then the
defaults are evil (even if the intent behind them is not). I say this because
they know most people will accept the defaults.

Maybe there needs to be a law about default settings and privacy.

~~~
totony
Or we should stop overlesgislating. Users are responsible for their own
actions.

~~~
rwallace
I agree that it's better when we can do without legislation and rely on
individual action instead. For example, individuals should be able to take a
copy of Windows 10, reverse engineer it, disable the spyware and offer the
result for free download.

Unfortunately, government legislation in the form of copyright law prohibits
this. If it were up to me, copyright law would be repealed. But failing that,
we can't have a situation where all the laws favor corporations and none favor
individuals, at least not unless we want to slide into the kind of dystopia
cyberpunk writers have been warning us about for generations.

~~~
userbinator
_Unfortunately, government legislation in the form of copyright law prohibits
this._

AFAIK what it doesn't prohibit is sharing information on how to disable that
spyware, or even software that will do it for you.

Take an original Windows ISO, feed it to an app, and out comes an ISO with
your customisations. If you're feeling neighbourly and rebellious, you can
share that ISO with others. This is not a new concept --- see projects like
nLite, and all the various customised Windows versions that you can find on
the torrent sites.

------
jamiesonbecker
This is the ultimate dark pattern. Microsoft provides a bait-and-switch for a
subscription product that provides an endless revenue stream (at a future cost
TBD), and then forces your upgrade. The best part is that you don't even know
what price it's going to cost you in the future, but you can't (easily) go
back to the product that you had.

~~~
dlp211
> Microsoft provides a bait-and-switch for a subscription product that
> provides an endless revenue stream (at a future cost TBD)

Disclaimer: MSFT employee, views expressed are my own, etc.

This is absolutely the last thing that Microsoft wants. I don't know where you
came up with this idea. Microsoft wants to ensure that once a user is using
Windows 10, to never be on anything but the latest available bits, with the
latest security patches. Creating a subscription model would fly directly in
the face of that outcome.

~~~
myrryr
Here is why the idea is coming up over and over again.

[http://betanews.com/2016/06/30/windows-10-subscriptions-
anni...](http://betanews.com/2016/06/30/windows-10-subscriptions-anniversary-
update/)

[http://www.zdnet.com/article/mystery-file-in-preview-
build-h...](http://www.zdnet.com/article/mystery-file-in-preview-build-hints-
at-windows-10-subscriptions/)

They won't, but between their downright dicey ways they have tried to force
people to upgrade, along with removing the ability to turn off Cortana /
Windows Store, ads being pushed in and the 'pay to remove ads from solitaire'
thing. People will not have a hard time believing they would do that as well.

We have seen microsoft go through some pretty dark times (Halloween papers
etc), and it looks like they are starting down that path again with a
vengeance.

If they only cared about having people apply security patches, they would make
sure they ONLY push security patches through their security channel, a
practice which they have abandoned.... again.

------
__b__
Imagine if they had tried this with their corporate customers.

My advice to home users would be to disconnect their Windows computers from
the internet and use some other OS for tasks that require internet. Use
Windows offline for the graphical tasks that Microsoft was founded on.

I remember the days before Windows had a TCP/IP stack. Gates did not see the
point in the internet or www immediately. UNIX computers were connected over
the phone lines. Windows computers were not. Gates eventually woke up and MS
copied the TCP/IP code they needed from BSD. The rest is history. Look at them
now.

One should not need an internet connection to run Excel and _create_
spreadsheets. If one needs to _send_ a spreadsheet to some remote computer,
there are other operating systems that can do that. Such as the one from which
Microsoft copied the TCP/IP stack.

~~~
m_mueller
Or, do exactly this with an offline windows VM on a POSIX host. Even with
enabled file sharing it should be reasonably secure in terms of privacy and at
the same time convenient. The only usecases where this is not ideal: gaming
and graphics heavy applications.

~~~
garaetjjte
If you have multiple monitors and graphics card you can assign one to VM with
almost no performance loss.

------
Fej
Who woulda thunk, forcibly upgrading users and possibly causing harm to
businesses just might be a sure-fire way to get a class-action lawsuit on your
hands.

I wonder if anyone on the Windows 10 dev team and/or their managers have ever
heard of HIPAA, and how telemetry could... cause issues.

~~~
scholia
_> I wonder if anyone on the Windows 10 dev team and/or their managers have
ever heard of HIPAA, and how telemetry could... cause issues._

They've heard about it but they haven't posted anything interesting about it.
Try searching for

"windows 10" hipaa site:microsoft.com

I'm not an expert but I'd guess that consumer Windows 10 out of the box
doesn't meet HIPAA, simply because it sends searches to Bing. (You could, of
course, type identical searches into Google, if you wanted.)

I'd also guess that business versions of Windows 10 with GP control can be
configured to meet HIPAA. I did the above search expecting to find a white
paper with the details, but, at a quick look, I can't see one.

Microsoft is targeting the health business via partners such as US Medical IT,
and it has done a lot of work on HIPAA compliance for Azure. Similar work on
Windows 10 may be overdue....

[http://usmedit.azurewebsites.net/](http://usmedit.azurewebsites.net/)

------
a3n
> The company said updates to Windows 10 are a choice, not a requirement,

I guess tell that to all the non-technical people who saw the options to
dismiss dialogs dwindle down to [OK].

~~~
curt15
Not to mention those who fell for the no-means-yes close button (which
violated MS's own UI guidelines).

~~~
wvenable
It was a notification dialog, not an action dialog:

[http://core0.staticworld.net/images/article/2016/05/gwx-
new-...](http://core0.staticworld.net/images/article/2016/05/gwx-
new-100662456-orig.png)

~~~
myrryr
it wasn't a notification, it was DOING something.

~~~
wvenable
It's a notification that something will happen later -- like all
notifications.

Look, Microsoft pushing Windows 10 upgrades is really annoying but that
doesn't mean one has the skew the facts to make it seem worse than it is. It
took me many clicks to install Windows 10 despite being nagged about it for 12
months.

------
mgalka
> The company said updates to Windows 10 are a choice, not a requirement

The other day, I woke up to my computer installing Windows 10 on its own. I
was out of commission for hours waiting for it to finish installing, then a
few more hours getting back to Windows 8 -- basically blocked an entire day of
work.

------
kyriakos
Probably settlement for these lawsuits will cost Microsoft a lot less than
people not upgrading. The strategy worked.

~~~
Silhouette
Then again, these lawsuits probably do more damage by perpetuating the
negative publicity around Windows 10 than through any direct financial impact
they might have.

Now that the free upgrade period for Windows 10 has run out, and it's clear
that large numbers of people didn't want Microsoft's latest product or buy
into its everything-cloudy vision even though they were literally giving the
OS away and heavily promoting the whole strategy, it will be interesting to
see what they try next.

~~~
dmfdmf
>...it will be interesting to see what they try next.

It seems clear to me they've had the meetings and made the decision to ram
Win10 down user's throats come hell or high water. They've given no indication
that they regret the Win10 hard-sell or that it was any kind of mistake or
misstep. On the contrary, they have doubled-down on the strategy and dismissed
all objections along the way. The misuse of the red X to mean "OK" instead of
"No" or "Cancel", breaking Windows Update so you could not block or hide the
GWX are clear signs of their intent.

Win10 is the core of Microsoft's strategy to compete with Apple and Google.
They want to become a marketing company and Windows 10 OS [Operating Spyware]
is key to their long-term strategy. They want to shutdown support for all the
remaining operating systems and push everyone onto Win10 as quickly as
possible. The strategy is further revealed by their announcement that Cortana
(and its associated collection of personal data and tracking) cannot be turned
off in all but the Enterprise or Education versions of Win10, neither of which
will be generally available.

My view is that this strategy will backfire. Win10 is not going to be
installed in any business that needs high data security either for operations
or regulatory requirements like HIPPA or the SEC, etc. The vast number of
companies currently using Win7 aren't going to move to Win10 unless Microsoft
reveals the scope of the spying and provides tools to shut it off without
buying the Enterprise version. Everything will come to a head in 2020 when
Win7 support is slated to end. At that point, I am planning on moving to Linux
and I don't think I am alone. But what I do is irrelevant to Microsoft
(essentially a consumer user of Windows) but what the installed base of
business users of Windows choose to do will determine the future of Windows.
It will be interesting to see who blinks first.

~~~
scholia
_> They want to shutdown support for all the remaining operating systems and
push everyone onto Win10 as quickly as possible._

They want to move everyone to Windows 10. This does not involve shutting down
support for anything else. The support periods are published a long time
ahead, and as you say yourself, Windows 7 will be supported until 2020.

 _> Win10 is not going to be installed in any business that needs high data
security either for operations or regulatory requirements like HIPPA or the
SEC, etc._

You appear to have missed the fact that the US Defense Department has already
starting moving four million users to Windows 10 precisely because of the
advanced security. I know banks and other organizations that are moving, too.

DoD-Wide Windows 10 Rapid Deployment to Boost Cybersecurity By Cheryl Pellerin
DoD News, Defense Media Activity [http://www.defense.gov/-News-Article-
View/Article/688721/dod...](http://www.defense.gov/-News-Article-
View/Article/688721/dod-wide-windows-10-rapid-deployment-to-boost-
cybersecurity)

~~~
oceanswave
Doesn't seem like all is well with that plan.

[http://federalnewsradio.com/defense/2016/03/army-crashes-
dod...](http://federalnewsradio.com/defense/2016/03/army-crashes-dods-
windows-10-party/)

~~~
scholia
Agreed. I think the standard army acronym is SNAFU ;-)

------
edoceo
I took my laptop to get upgraded to Windows 10 in the store. They claimed I
would get a free laptop if they couldn't complete the upgrade that day.

They asked if I had a backup I said no. Then I was told it would take 7 days!!
So I made my own backup (2h)

I went back in and asked them to upgrade. They plugged in some USB stick and
ran some program. A command console window appeared and the process halted.
The tech was confused. A manager looked at it. Then I was told it would take 5
days!! I asked for my free laptop. Oh, sorry you don't qualify cause you Win8
system has some unknown issue. WTF!?

WHERE IS MY FREE LAPTOP MICROSOFT! CHEATS AND LIARS!

~~~
JumpCrisscross
Did you get their refusal in writing, or otherwise record it? If so, you may
have a small-claims case for the value of a new laptop, your time and damages.

~~~
edoceo
I don't feel like fighting M$ for a crap-top. I've got a business to run. It's
a waste of my time.

Also: only reason for upgrade? My customers have Win10. I wanted it for
testing only.

And the upgrade blocker from in the store? Cause syslinux was my bootloader
and Win update fails if Win is not the active partition.

Did my own upgrade a day after, took about 3h

------
whatthew
Suing over automatic updates could set a bad precedent. Who wants to maintain
several old versions of software? I know I don't.

~~~
oatmealsnap
Seriously. I understand why people were upset over this, business owners in
particular, but as a web developer, I'm (not so secretly) happy they did this.

As far as I can tell, there are two main camps of Windows 10 haters: users who
know their systems really well and have it customized to fit their niche
needs, and less technical users who are afraid of change. Those technical
users should know how to turn off the update suggestions, and the less
technical people are in a better place, now.

After using Windows 10 for a year, it is undeniably better than Windows 8.1 in
every way, and better than or equal to Windows 7. The fewer less technical
people out there using Edge instead of IE 11, the better.

~~~
milankragujevic
> After using Windows 10 for a year, it is undeniably better than Windows 8.1
> in every way, and better than or equal to Windows 7. In my case, it's the
> complete opposite. Windows 10 is so sluggish and buggy, WiFi doesn't work
> when returning from sleep, battery is draining really fast, programs open
> slowly, even with an SSD, the screen has a weird flicker and blue lines on
> the top... These problems don't occur on Windows 8.1. TBH, Windows 7 works
> worse than 10 on my laptop, but that's because there are no drivers directly
> written for 7, so it BSODs a lot.

~~~
scholia
All my Windows 10 upgrades have improved performance, so far (touching wood
here, throwing salt etc). You might get an improvement with the new version
due on or after August 2, but if not, it's worth trying a clean
installation....

 _> Windows 7 works worse than 10 on my laptop, but that's because there are
no drivers directly written for 7, so it BSODs a lot_

You can usually run the new OS on the old hardware, but not necessarily the
other way round. Today's hardware is being designed for Windows 10 and has
probably never been tested with Windows 7 (unless it's a business PC from Dell
or HP).

------
sidcool
Now that 29 July has passed, the last date of free upgrade, they hopefully
won't pester anymore

~~~
Noseshine
I just read it's actually still possible to upgrade for free: Microsoft keeps
the option open for people who use the "assistive technologies", and all you
have to do is to say acknowledge that you use them, there is no actual check.

[https://www.microsoft.com/en-
us/accessibility/windows10upgra...](https://www.microsoft.com/en-
us/accessibility/windows10upgrade)

    
    
        > For the general public, the free upgrade offer for Windows 10 ends on July 29.
        > However, if you use assistive technologies, you can still get the free upgrade 
        > offer even after the general public deadline expires as Microsoft continues our 
        > efforts to improve the Windows 10 experience for people who use these technologies.

~~~
userbinator
I'm not surprised that there isn't any check, because what MS considers
"assistive technology" is extremely broad:

[https://www.microsoft.com/enable/at/types.aspx](https://www.microsoft.com/enable/at/types.aspx)

Do you use an alternative keyboard layout, a trackball, or even a _touch
screen_ (!)? Have you used the on-screen keyboard, or the built-in screen
magnifier? Then you've used an "assistive technology", according to Microsoft.
Combine that with their desire to push Windows 10 on _everyone_ , and you can
see they're probably going to leave this option open for the near future.

------
__Joker
With all the privacy setting opted in, i.e. no data to be sent to windows 10,
I still have Cortona process running on my machine, which I seem to be not
able to kill off( not spending any more time doing it as it is only Windows
specific works machine, which I rarely use). Is there a option to uninstall
Cortona ?

~~~
plushpuffin
I've read a few guides that say you can use a race condition to kill the
process and rename its directory before it automatically restarts itself.

~~~
ams6110
Yes, basically you need to rename
C:\Windows\SystemApps\Microsoft.Windows.Cortana_xxxxxxxxx folder. I prefixed
mine with an _ character.

------
ben_jones
I would kill to see the actual metrics proving the value of these Microsoft
policies vs whatever adverse effects they cause (like certain companies
delaying installs / purchases etc.).'

Same goes for the original "Always online" policy for the Xbox One (which I
believe was rescinded).

My guess is that they were just random ideas that sounded good to various
executives and were implemented without actual research to stand on.

------
davidf18
Actually, it is important to upgrade to Windows 10 or any other updates to
Windows because each iteration of Windows has additional cyber security
measures over the previous ones, sometimes taking into account new features in
the Intel CPU hardware.

I would like a simple single, privacy selected option.

Also, I want to be able to turn Cortana off.

But in my case I run mac with Parallels VM running Windows 10 as a guest so
not so much of an issue.

------
jalami
I won't use a Microsoft Windows computer as my daily driver due to dark
patterns, privacy issues, new business model etc, but I also wouldn't advocate
for strict legislation in this area. The only legislation I think I would back
is mandatory information disclosure on install. EULAs are important and it is
to detriment of the consumer that we agree to terms we aren't aware of. Still,
if there's an opt out toggle buried somewhere, then the company is aware
someone wants to do so.

How we decide what information is important to consumers is debatable, but
consumers can't make informed decisions if they don't have the information
available or are not presented a choice. If information isn't provided by
primary sources, many of whom would rather not provide it in an easily
digestible manner, then it's a guessing game. Things like applying whack-a-
mole patches to fix the shortcomings post-install is essentially plugging a
sponge boat blindfolded. Even grouped settings toggles in a customer-fronting
GUI can be broken out and flipped on individually without your explicit
approval tomorrow so your Windows Firewall IP hack is just that, a well-
meaning, but messy and temporary hack.

I'm a firm supporter of "vote with your dollar", however I think voting with
your voice is also important. If you're unhappy with something a company is
doing, shoot an email or call someone if possible and explain why you're not
using their product. Hell, even and maybe especially if you are a customer,
let them know you're not happy about a policy. Just like in the public sphere,
private companies don't know whether you're an ideological abstainer or simply
someone they haven't advertised hard enough to yet. Part of this problem is
due to companies knowing full well they're acting against the consumers, but
consumers often shut up and move along silently after getting their wallets
out. I've emailed Microsoft multiple times about their policies on binding
arbitration, their dark patterns and privacy policies. I may not be a
customer, but they sure as hell know why.

~~~
blub
The complete failure of IT privacy in the US proves that voting with your
dollar and voice doesn't work. The very existance of companies like Google,
Facebook and thousands of others whose main purpose if data analytics proves
that.

While your opinion sounds balanced at first sight (let's allow customers to
choose...), it is in fact completely misguided. Such arguments have been used
by many harmful industries such as tobacco and food producers pushing HFCS and
other damaging foods or additives.

They know they can let the customer choose, because without regulation they
can out-advertise, out-market and outwit all but the most savvy consumers. And
even they can't escape due to network effects and lobbying.

No. Privacy should be regulated to the point that companies think 10 times
before gathering one additional piece of information and then decide against
it because they know they will be fined 50% of their profits when they fuck
up.

~~~
jalami
>The complete failure of IT privacy in the US proves that voting with your
dollar and voice doesn't work. The very existance of companies like Google,
Facebook and thousands of others whose main purpose if data analytics proves
that.

I don't think voting with your dollar is a failure, I just think it's
currently too niche a hobby to move mountains. From my completely unscientific
empiricism, it seems only super hot button issues, regarding religion for
example, cause enough Americans to weigh a company's economic policies vs
their ideological ones in large enough numbers while also making enough noise
about it. Many consumers seem to make one dimensional decisions when choosing
a product or service: How much does it cost? This is exacerbated by the amount
the public sphere is taking over private decision making, not ameliorated.

For example, citizens concerned with wage disparity aren't buying goods whose
executives pay their workers fairly; they're shopping at Walmart. For some
reason, economic or ideological issues that stem from the market aren't the
market's problem, but become a problem for Washington. Do I think putting the
mean and median wage of non-executive employees on the package would help
here? Not until we decide these are problems of the market, but honest
information disclosure will be important then.

On top of that, a great many consumers are happy with the status quo.
"Personal information" is some nebulous magical currency that they can get
free stuff for. Just because you or I value this doesn't mean most people do.
I've talked with a great many, otherwise intelligent, people that would have
it no other way. They can use Facebook _for free_ and to them the value gained
far and wide exceeds the costs.

You and I personally think this calculation is short sighted and incorrect,
but if you assume the consumer is too stupid to make decisions for themselves
regarding their own information then where does that lead us as a society?
(not to mention the regulatory overhead)

------
LargeCompanies
Microsoft needs not to try and force Windows 10 upgrades onto their users.
Their users' machines which the majority of them are not created by Microsoft
may or may not have trouble running the latest.

My $300 HP laptop after the forced upgrade is now almost a brick. I have to do
a good amount of work that was unnecessary because MS wants to boost Windows
10s numbers no matter how awful it is for their customers.

Your not Apple, Microsoft you do not control both the hardware and software.
Please make it a tad more difficult in terms of installing the latest OS ..
make the user select if they want to do this via a few windows.

------
homero
I'm so happy that damn icon and spam is gone! W7 till I die!

------
Too
If ms would have called it windows 8.1.2 and installed it via the regular
automatic windows update, would people have been equally upset?

~~~
userbinator
Yes, because it is clearly a _huge_ change from Windows 8.1.

------
niftich
It's easier to ask for forgiveness (and be subject to lawsuits) than
permission (and have a bunch of people opt-out).

Microsoft needs a weapon against Google and Apple, who are both well underway
into becoming 'services' companies, and whose devices we walk around with
every single day.

Microsoft is trying to leverage installed base it still has in some people's
homes to drive some traffic to integrated Microsoft services, the same way
Google and Apple have driven traffic to their properties from day one. They
can't afford not to be aggressive -- the average person will vacillate over
the Windows 10 upgrade but then _install Chrome on every single device without
question_.

If you were in Microsoft's shoes, what would you do? (And not mismanaging your
product lines for the previous 8 years is a cheeky non-answer)

~~~
jessaustin
_...the average person will vacillate over the Windows 10 upgrade but then
install Chrome on every single device without question._

Holy crap it's almost as if users are happy to install software that they like
and trust because they've used it, and hesitant to install software they're
suspicious will screw them over because it has in the past.

