Microsoft says it has “listened to feedback” following a privacy row over a new tool which takes regular screenshots of users’ activity.
It was labelled a potential “privacy nightmare” by critics when it was unveiled in May 2024 - prompting the tech giant to postpone its release. It now plans to relaunch the artificial intelligence (AI) powered tool in November on its new CoPilot+ computers.
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When it initially announced the tool at its developer conference in May, Microsoft said it used AI “to make it possible to access virtually anything you have ever seen on your PC”, and likened it to having photographic memory. It said Recall could search through a users’ past activity, including their files, photos, emails and browsing history.
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But critics quickly raised concerns, given the quantity of sensitive data the system would harvest, with one expert labelling it a potential “privacy nightmare."
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[Pavan Davuluri, Microsoft’s corporate vice president of Windows and devices says] that “Windows offers tools to help you control your privacy and customise what gets saved for you to find later”.
However a technical blog about it states that “diagnostic data” from the tool may be shared with the firm depending on individual privacy settings.
[Microsoft says in a blog post that users can remove Recall entirely by using the optional features settings in Windows.]
I have been using Linux off and on for 25 years (using the server pretty consistently, but always hedged with the desktop for various reasons). Since Proton and GE-Proton allow every game I want to play to work in Linux, back when Recall was first announced, I decided to finally stop hedging and went all in on the Linux desktop.
And I’m not going back. Everything is working for me and Microsoft can screw off if they think I’m going to allow such blatant spyware in my house. Their telemetry was always suspect, but this is now overt despite any assurances they attempt to make.
Edit>> And their “oh you can uninstall Recall” isn’t trustworthy when they will easily reinstall it with a Windows update (they have done this in the past with other software — notably Edge and Teams).
What the heck am I going to do when win10 stops getting security patches? I really wish Valve would open up SteamOS to desktops in a public and supported way. That kind of pressure from valve has forced MS to play nice to users in the past. Anyone remember MS demanding that all software for Win8 be sold through the MS store only? And Valve said, fine we’ll make our own OS, with blackjack! And Hookers! And steam machines became a thing. Noone bought them. But it didn’t matter. It was enough pressure for MS to open up to having 3rd party storefronts again. I feel like we need this again. Also, if linux played nice with anti cheat, and discord I would probably be fine ditching windows but as it stands I’d miss out on playing games with my friends.
Anyway. Privacy Nightmare AI tool bad.
SteamOS is focused on gaming, so its not a full replacement for Win10. There are ton of Linux operating systems for general use (even those that SteamOS is based on), without gaming focus and being a “normal” operating system like Windows. And if you want a gaming oriented OS, then there are plenty alternatives already: HoloISO, aiming for a SteamOS like system, and bunch of other: https://github.com/ChimeraOS/chimeraos/wiki/OS-Comparison . So there is no need to wait for SteamOS to open up as a general installation media on desktop.
I honestly don’t want to leave windows. I did use linux for years and I don’t want to tinker with my OS or my applications anymore. And you’re right SteamOS isn’t a general purpose OS. My comment was more in the hopes that if it were pushed out like that, that MS would respond with more consumer friendly approaches to the desktop so I wouldn’t HAVE to switch again and deal with the jank. And there will be jank. I know a lot of games work now with proton but how about the Affinity Suite? I found a github that describes how to set up the process in like 18 easy steps so you can begin to install a custom wine for it and just like no I don’t want to do that. I want to just keep using my pc that works with the OS I actually paid money for and not get harvested. I am so tired.
This is why I never really understand when people go “Just use Linux!!”. It isn’t a feasible option for everyone. For me, I work full time and I don’t have the energy to constantly fix things if they break. When I switched to Linux, I took great pains to ensure that my computer use case is one that could work in Linux, built a computer with parts known to be fine in Linux(including an AMD graphics card) and run Debian Stable on because I wanted something that wouldn’t be constantly updating. I’m in a comfy situation now, but I did a lot of planning beforehand that you can’t really expect people to do. Like, it’s great if we get more people using Linux, but that’s not a trivial ask.
And that’s ok! Like it’s totally ok to be the os that it is. And it’s ok that it’s not for anyone. It’s certainly not for my desktop atm. But then it’s super amazing at appliance stuff. I’ve got home assistant on a minipc and truenas on a server. It’s ROCK SOLID when it’s deployed where it will shine.
The OS that comes preinstalled will always have the largest market share unfortunately. The average person is not going to install a linux iso to a usb and disable bitlocker and whatever else windows adds to make it harder to change the OS. That is before even setting it up and making sure everything works. It helps if you are friends with someone that is into installing operating systems that can help you but not everyone has that friend. The best linux can do is try and keep microsoft in line. Valve has been doing a lot of the heavy lifting in that regard. It is also why user friendly distros are so important. Somebody who thinks emails and the internet is the same thing is not going to go for Arch.
Learning any OS isn’t a trivial task, but that’s something people seems to forget a lot.
But I get why people would say “just use Linux”, because if by chance you have the means to switch then why would you stay locked to a tool made by a company that doesn’t care about you or your needs ? It would be counterproductive. (Also getting more Linux users would be beneficial for the Linux community, it could even be beneficial to everyone if that number is big enough to make Linux a serious competitor but that’s more a distant dream than a close reality)
Also, I too love Linux, but when I ran a dual-boot for six weeks last summer I had to troubleshoot it almost every single day. Because of that I ended up just going back to Windows and making sure I keep it clean with O&O ShutUp. Some systems just aren’t compatible with Linux and mine is one of them.
Even when it was working, only approximately half of my games ran on it, so I needed Windows anyway. (Though that may be on me for choosing Mint instead of a more gaming-centric distro.)
I’m going to go back to Linux when get a new system and can have a gaming-dedicated PC, but for now, I’m stuck with Windows.
I do think linux needs some tools that automate that sort of thing so the 18 steps becomes like 3. It doesn’t even need to be by the distro itself but scripts made for it. I managed to make a script that does the same thing as robocopy does on windows to replace a certain rundata file for gamemaker 8.1 since it had that glitch that caused the the rundata to become invalid. I did share that script on my magazine in kbin.run and kbin.social unfortunately both are defunct but I could always share it somewhere else or make a community where people ask for help with installing stuff and people make a script for it like /c/makemeascript or something. I will have a look at the affinity suite and see what steps it takes to see if It is something I am skilled enough to automate.
I get you, but relying on Microsoft not doing any anticonsumer decisions is like hoping Adobe will suddenly respect their users… It won’t happen and even if it did it’ll be short lived, it just won’t get you anywhere.
Would games with anticheat work in a windows 10 vm? I am not interested in games that go out of their way to not work in wine but if it works in a vm of windows 10 you might be able to use that for gaming and whatever host os for your web browser emails etc.
Discord works great on Linux nowadays. Depending on the game, anti-cheat might also be fine. I play Helldivers 2 without any issues. It’s fine if you don’t have the oomph, but Pop_OS and Bazzite are both super solid ditros with a gaming focus. I have been using Pop as my only OS on my desktop for months now and really only needed the command line for VPN access and Switch modding
The whole Recall thing is what finally made me get off my lazy ass and make the jump to Linux. I chose PopOS, and I’ve been very impressed with the out-of-the-box experience. Between Steam and Lutris, I can play just about any game I want to.
It feels like I actually own my laptop now.
MS doesn’t realize how close they are to being disposable to gamers. If a few more game companies made their catalogs linux-native, they’d be toast.
Lots of people would be shocked just how many games offer linux-native binaries, not just windows ones that work with proton.
