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Timber Wolf

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Perhaps this article is just overdrawing...

I just wanted to reinstall/update my system this weekend and informed myself again about the newest OS facts regarding Win7 and 10.

But the fact, that you can´t disable all OS possibilities to call home in every version except in Enterprise Edition is just ridiculous. And those are volume licenses for companies etc. and a normal "private" user will not get it easily.

Also the fact, that voice/video/text material is collected in masses and automatically sent to clouds, Microsoft or even third party enterprises under the cloak of customer satisfaction, digital rights issues and product improvement makes me laugh out loud and welcomes us all in the world of Big Data.

From the point of IT security´s view this OS is (still) just a horror. I wonder, why there´s no individual NSA Edition on the market. I think the guys in Fort Meade shed one or two tears, when they think of having the possibility of millions of people installing their surveillance software voluntarily :biggrin:

I´ll wait until the OS security options are changed and can be disabled completely or there are fitting and good working tools to avoid this mass data extraction (regardless of which kind or volume this extraction takes place).

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From the point of IT security´s view this OS is (still) just a horror. I wonder, why there´s no individual NSA Edition on the market. I think the guys in Fort Meade shed one or two tears, when they think of having the possibility of millions of people installing their surveillance software voluntarily :biggrin:

.

I have No problem with the NSA taking all and any personal data from Me and My family that they want. I sincerely hope they do and with everyone else. I would gladly install any surveillance software voluntarily.

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But the fact, that you can´t disable all OS possibilities to call home in every version except in Enterprise Edition is just ridiculous. And those are volume licenses for companies etc. and a normal "private" user will not get it easily.

Hmmm... Some manual tweaking of registry, services and scheduled tasks supposed to help... Or I`m wrong?

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The point is, if this is MS's declared policy as an operating system vendor from now on you cannot trust that circumventions to suppress unwelcome data transmissions will remain working after each and any feature upgrade which they are pushing on your machine (unless you have the Enterprise version installed). While it may be possible to filter much or even all of it via virtualization and a custom made proxy/gateway PC in your LAN, the administrative effort to ensure after subsequent (pushed) upgrades that your line of defense still holds increases substantially.

The EULA/Terms of Use regulations are simply unacceptable (illegal even under the laws of Germany), to the point where I would have to say that as a corporation or anyone dealing with (business) secrets that are not to be disclosed to outsiders, Win 10 automatically disqualifies even without making use of the MS cloud and Cortana.

EVEN IF MS changes its policy, the fact that they tried to establish this scheme puts a fat question mark on their trustworthiness for the foreseeable future.

In practice, the ability for corporations to (seriously) consider alternatives may turn out to be extremely limited (as in, the exit strategy is going to be extremely costly and painful if your entire IT infrastructure is built around MS Windows concepts like domain servers, active directories, back office installations, ...

For private users, the question is if you are willing to break away from the Windows platform for, well, ... what, exactly?

Linux is possible (WHICH Linux however is very much open for debate), but from an IT security perspective worse than Windows, but for different reasons. In addition you would have to throw away much if not all of your computer know-how, which was a substantial investment for most. And you have to accept a serious reduction in computer games that you could play.

OpenBSD may be the most secure operating system there is (nothing protects you against stupid behavior of course), but it's even more obscure than Linux.

Android, iOS, MacOS - well, you could just as well stick with Windows. It's a mere question to which faceless IT corporation you cede all your privacy.

For years to come, Steel Beasts will remain a Windows application. We might invest some effort to make a future switch towards Linux easier, but it would be a major undertaking. Compartmentalization with the help of virtual machines may be the best practical advice at this point. Have a virtual machine for your online banking and email communication, one for your gaming, one for your browsing. Something like that. Transferring information from one VM into another will of course be painful.

Brave new world.

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The point is, if this is MS's declared policy as an operating system vendor from now on you cannot trust that circumventions to suppress unwelcome data transmissions will remain working after each and any feature upgrade which they are pushing on your machine (unless you have the Enterprise version installed). While it may be possible to filter much or even all of it via virtualization and a custom made proxy/gateway PC in your LAN, the administrative effort to ensure after subsequent (pushed) upgrades that your line of defense still holds increases substantially.

The EULA/Terms of Use regulations are simply unacceptable (illegal even under the laws of Germany), to the point where I would have to say that as a corporation or anyone dealing with (business) secrets that are not to be disclosed to outsiders, Win 10 automatically disqualifies even without making use of the MS cloud and Cortana.

EVEN IF MS changes its policy, the fact that they tried to establish this scheme puts a fat question mark on their trustworthiness for the foreseeable future.

In practice, the ability for corporations to (seriously) consider alternatives may turn out to be extremely limited (as in, the exit strategy is going to be extremely costly and painful if your entire IT infrastructure is built around MS Windows concepts like domain servers, active directories, back office installations, ...

For private users, the question is if you are willing to break away from the Windows platform for, well, ... what, exactly?

Linux is possible (WHICH Linux however is very much open for debate), but from an IT security perspective worse than Windows, but for different reasons. In addition you would have to throw away much if not all of your computer know-how, which was a substantial investment for most. And you have to accept a serious reduction in computer games that you could play.

OpenBSD may be the most secure operating system there is (nothing protects you against stupid behavior of course), but it's even more obscure than Linux.

Android, iOS, MacOS - well, you could just as well stick with Windows. It's a mere question to which faceless IT corporation you cede all your privacy.

For years to come, Steel Beasts will remain a Windows application. We might invest some effort to make a future switch towards Linux easier, but it would be a major undertaking. Compartmentalization with the help of virtual machines may be the best practical advice at this point. Have a virtual machine for your online banking and email communication, one for your gaming, one for your browsing. Something like that. Transferring information from one VM into another will of course be painful.

Brave new world.

I dont know all about that,but if it brings us a playable Marder and Jag ill be happy.:bigsmile:

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The point is, if this is MS's declared policy as an operating system vendor from now on you cannot trust that circumventions to suppress unwelcome data transmissions will remain working after each and any feature upgrade which they are pushing on your machine (unless you have the Enterprise version installed). While it may be possible to filter much or even all of it via virtualization and a custom made proxy/gateway PC in your LAN, the administrative effort to ensure after subsequent (pushed) upgrades that your line of defense still holds increases substantially.

The EULA/Terms of Use regulations are simply unacceptable (illegal even under the laws of Germany), to the point where I would have to say that as a corporation or anyone dealing with (business) secrets that are not to be disclosed to outsiders, Win 10 automatically disqualifies even without making use of the MS cloud and Cortana.

EVEN IF MS changes its policy, the fact that they tried to establish this scheme puts a fat question mark on their trustworthiness for the foreseeable future.

In practice, the ability for corporations to (seriously) consider alternatives may turn out to be extremely limited (as in, the exit strategy is going to be extremely costly and painful if your entire IT infrastructure is built around MS Windows concepts like domain servers, active directories, back office installations, ...

For private users, the question is if you are willing to break away from the Windows platform for, well, ... what, exactly?

Linux is possible (WHICH Linux however is very much open for debate), but from an IT security perspective worse than Windows, but for different reasons. In addition you would have to throw away much if not all of your computer know-how, which was a substantial investment for most. And you have to accept a serious reduction in computer games that you could play.

OpenBSD may be the most secure operating system there is (nothing protects you against stupid behavior of course), but it's even more obscure than Linux.

Android, iOS, MacOS - well, you could just as well stick with Windows. It's a mere question to which faceless IT corporation you cede all your privacy.

For years to come, Steel Beasts will remain a Windows application. We might invest some effort to make a future switch towards Linux easier, but it would be a major undertaking. Compartmentalization with the help of virtual machines may be the best practical advice at this point. Have a virtual machine for your online banking and email communication, one for your gaming, one for your browsing. Something like that. Transferring information from one VM into another will of course be painful.

Brave new world.

+1, Thanks.

I wouldn´t get it better straight to the point :luxhello:

The alternatives are rare, at first keep Win7/8. But it´s predictable, when MS will cancel their support for those OSs.

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To assess the credibility of privacy issue claims, always ask these two long proven questions:

When you track the money, where does it lead you?

Who benefits from doing it like this?

Some weeks ago, short before W10 was officially released, I stumbled over a site where a list with some-40 in-Windows settings were presented that must manually be altered and switched off to avoid them having spying on the user. And even then some stuff still gets send to MS. Some of the new featzres need that, okay. Question is whether people really need such features so desperately when so many already have said they do not use nor want them (speech assistant for example). But I think most of these new functions are just constructed alibis to give MS a reason to fish off more private data - and train users to adapt and slowly accept this over the years.

Of course, people already got trained by antisocial media to become increasingly uncritical and uncaring for their privacy. One can say that people expose themselves to the public voluntarily. But I would insist on also remarking that you had to slowly train people to get more and more "shameless" about their privacy - not by using sticks and whips, but setting up alluring persuasions like FB, Twitter and the like. Nobody lives completely unaffected by the Zeitgeist. And the Zeitgeist has ben massively and intentionally manipulated by Google, Facebook, Microsoft, Apple et. al. After all, their business models are what they are.

Also never forget that Microsoft falls under American jurisdiction, and American jurisdiction means American surveillance and intel agencies. Some of that was about anti-terror, once. More now is about business espionage. But most is about widening and increasing all governments' grab for power and totalitarian control. The desire to always increase power over and control of its people, is the inherent, unavoidable nature of every state government that is present in form of a state government, plus its bureaucracy. It cannot be avoided,like life cannot avoid to grow old and one day die again.

I'm not in any kind of hurry to get Win10. I have W7. Computer and telephone are not to be used for any kind of info that one would not like to write on an open tourist postcard as well.

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Only issue I had with the Windows update to 10 was dealing with my Creative SB Pro X-Fi card. Drivers are supposed to come out sometime this month. Rather than wait however, I just switched to my Realtek HD card. And just as another reminder, do not forget to go through the walkthrough for disabling all those basic evil Windows apps one does not want.

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After four years of absence and no update, XP-Antispy will be re-released by its developer with special functions to help gagging Microsoft's hunger for private data. The guy really seems to be pissed. :)

German source:

http://www.chip.de/news/XPAntiSpy-fuer-Datenkrake-Windows-10-Entwickler-kuendigt-Update-an_82342658.html#&utm_source=focus&utm_medium=focus&utm_content=FO2008_xpantispy&utm_campaign=focus_home

http://xp-antispy.org/en/2015/08/lebenszeichen_/

I know the tool from earlier Windows version. VERY HIGHLY recommended.

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Just upgraded my win7 64b PC and win8 32b Asus tablet to win10. So far it's ok. Upgrade was seamless and easy. For one it was a 2 GB download, while the other was 2.5 GB download.

The installer wants 5 GB of space to work with before it downloads and installs. Since both of these machines have 64 GB SSDs for C drive, space is at a premium and I had to clean stuff off. Once the upgrade was done, there was some more space available on C:, so that was nice. Still waiting for when Microsoft will support moving the Users and ProgramData folders to a non-C: location.

For the user experience, I think it is slightly worse than win7 and slightly better than win8. I really only upgraded to maintain currency and to get it while it's free.

It really wants you to use your Live account to login, and that's a major crux for the privacy issues. I keep a local account. It cripples some functionality, but it's nothing big, and my LAN storage is based off my local ID, so it's better that way.

SB works. :)

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Still waiting for when Microsoft will support moving the Users and ProgramData folders to a non-C: location.

It's not well documented and was a bit of a surprise to me, but if you move the Users' directory to a different drive with the Windows Explorer, Windows is smart enough to remap everything to that new location. (Apparently this works since Win7, if not Vista).

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It's not well documented and was a bit of a surprise to me, but if you move the Users' directory to a different drive with the Windows Explorer, Windows is smart enough to remap everything to that new location. (Apparently this works since Win7, if not Vista).

Using Windows 7, I tried that relocating thing last year after googling for information about it, I ended up with one of the usual lists you can find - and some time later with a big hassle to get it undone. It works relatively easy for User's Picture, Music and Video folder, but I definitely would recommend to avoid doing it with the User's Data folder as long as you are not well-prepared, ready to spend a lot of time in adapting your installed applications to the new storage location, and being prepared to deal with unforseen troubles. Do not do it if not really knowing what you are doing. And make sure you have a good Why for taking this upon you. Regarding the data folder, its no self-running show.

Again, speaking for Windows 7.

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