Microsoft Calls Home Every Day

[Airencracken]

janked from Slashdot (http://yro.slashdot.org/yro/06/06/08/0119253.shtml)

"Microsoft Corp. acknowledged Wednesday that it needs to better inform users that its tool for determining whether a computer is running a pirated copy of Windows also quietly checks in daily with the software maker. The company said the undisclosed daily check is a safety measure designed to allow the tool, called Windows Genuine Advantage, to quickly shut down in case of a malfunction." The EULA is suppose to disclosed this daily call in feature. Lauren Weinstein, who is co-founder of People for Internet Responsibility, was one of the first people to notice the daily communications to Microsoft. Report from Yahoo.com"
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Really who is surprised. I wonder though if it could collect personal information... Also I wonder how this affects WINE users.

[InfiniteNothing]

That is huge privacy intrusion. Of course they can capture personal info. With your IP addy they could track you and or your Win use. This effects all windows users, not just the people with illegal copies. I wonder if there's a patch out to prevent this.

[Airencracken]

I doubt it. The WGA thing is used quite a bit now.

[Jeffbx]

:stupid:

You can choose not to use it in XP, but then you can't download the latest patches & service packs from MS.

Also, I highly doubt they are sending any personal info - they have been VERY careful about that because the backlash would be tremendous, and they're trying to avoid bad press about security at all costs.

I'd imagine the only thing it would do is prevent that OS from downloading any patches or SPs & probabliy give you some nasty warning every time you log on.

[Markel]

I'd imagine the only thing it would do is prevent that OS from downloading any patches or SPs & probabliy give you some nasty warning every time you log on.
I had my firewall blocking outbound traffic from the wga executable. After a few times, it put up a nasty message about my (legitimate, registered) copy of XP being illegal. So I started letting it call home, and things have gone back to normal.

[zero2dash]

Kinda makes me want to switch to another OS. :shrug:

[Airencracken]

Kinda makes me want to switch to another OS. :shrug:

<-------is posting from SUSE 10.1. :D

[Pemolis]

Windows Genuine Advantage and Windows Notification are 2 separate programs.

Genuine advantage is only activated when windows tries to contact microsoft in Reference to Patching.

Windows Notification.. well it checks EVERYDAY whether your copy of winxp is a genuine copy, and if it is not, will spam message after message stating that "your copy is not completely legal, please contact microsoft to rectify the info".

So they have collected ALOT More off your pc using notification than genuine advantage (in addition, they loaded another module that runs Everytime the computer starts, and wrapped it into the startup of the computer so that there is no easy way around it.

Strange cause they have it under "Critical Updates". ALot of people didn't look at it before the installed it.

Genuine Advantage is different than Notification because Genuine advantage doesn't run Every Single Time your computer runs if you don't want it to (disable automatic updates).

[zero2dash]

<-------is posting from SUSE 10.1. :D

Yeah, after seeing you mention a lot of the improvements that are in SUSE 10.1, I might check that out again. SUSE was really the only *nix build that I really enjoyed using overall; not that any of the (billion) others aren't good, or the other 6 or 7 that I've tried weren't good, but...SUSE just felt the most natural to me for whatever reason. :)

[Airencracken]

Yeah, after seeing you mention a lot of the improvements that are in SUSE 10.1, I might check that out again. SUSE was really the only *nix build that I really enjoyed using overall; not that any of the (billion) others aren't good, or the other 6 or 7 that I've tried weren't good, but...SUSE just felt the most natural to me for whatever reason. :)

Dude I will not boot into winblows now unless absolutely necessary (e.g. Gaming) not only is it buggy and ugly, it's less functional. I can get way more work done in 'nix than I can in windows by advent of the virtual desktops, the lack of crashing and freeze-ups and the kick ass OSS applications that are bundled with SUSE (Openoffice, amaroK, etc.). Right now I'm also working on reviving an old lappy of mine with FreeBSD and Xfce 4. I figure the FreeBSD experience couldn't hurt.

I'm really enjoying SUSE a lot, but there are things that could be better. I miss the portage/emerge system that Gentoo employed for package management, YaST just doesn't cut it IMO. And then there are things that windows just does well, like gaming. Yes, Linux can be frustrating but it's a worthwhile transition to make.

How do you say awesome and annoying in one word?

Linux.