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A PR disaster: Microsoft has lost trust with its users, and Windows Recall is the straw that broke the camel's back (www.windowscentral.com)

submitted 5 months ago by lemmee_in@lemm.ee to c/technology@lemmy.world

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It's a nightmare scenario for Microsoft. The headlining feature of its new Copilot+ PC initiative, which is supposed to drive millions of PC sales over the next couple of years, is under significant fire for being what many say is a major breach of privacy and security on Windows. That feature in question is Windows Recall, a new AI tool designed to remember everything you do on Windows. The feature that we never asked and never wanted it.

Microsoft, has done a lot to degrade the Windows user experience over the last few years. Everything from obtrusive advertisements to full-screen popups, ignoring app defaults, forcing a Microsoft Account, and more have eroded the trust relationship between Windows users and Microsoft.

It's no surprise that users are already assuming that Microsoft will eventually end up collecting that data and using it to shape advertisements for you. That really would be a huge invasion of privacy, and people fully expect Microsoft to do it, and it's those bad Windows practices that have led people to this conclusion.

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[–] peregus@lemmy.world 10 points 5 months ago (4 children)

Microsoft has already taken a step back: Microsoft implements drastic changes to Recall after criticism

Recall needs to be enabled during installation
Windows Hello is needed so that only the users can view it's own screenshots
Recall database will be encrypted

[–] LiveLM@lemmy.zip 14 points 5 months ago* (last edited 5 months ago) (1 children)

It's what they should have done from the beginning, there must be a horde of MSFT employees holding back the urge of saying "told you so" to their boss right now lol

[–] peregus@lemmy.world 8 points 5 months ago

there must be a horde of MSFT employees holding back the urge of saying “told you so” to their boss right now lol

🤣

[–] FangedWyvern42@lemmy.world 13 points 5 months ago (3 children)

And no one is going to trust them on this. They’ve burned that bridge.

[–] Katana314@lemmy.world 6 points 5 months ago

I guess if you want to verify the truth of this statement, look at Unity. They walked back their per-install system, but the indie community still moved away from them because it seemed clear they might try to do that at some point in the future.

[–] d00ery@lemmy.world 1 points 5 months ago

Who needs trust when you have a monopoly.

[–] anon_8675309@lemmy.world 10 points 5 months ago

I really hope the damage is done. They need to be knocked down a peg. This all should have been done first. Whoever thought this was a good idea is horrible.

[–] Lancoian@lemmy.world 6 points 5 months ago (1 children)

Yeah bur for the non tech oriented user it's still difficult . Most devices bought come with OEM install.

Even for a regular user it's going to sound like There is a virus that reads and remembers everything on your computer but you can turn it off and trust us it would be off.

[–] peregus@lemmy.world 3 points 5 months ago

Even for PCs that come with Windows preinstalled, there's still the need to set it up at the first start (account, privacy and such), so I think that the option to enable Recall will be there.