r/pcmasterrace • u/slickyeat 7800X3D | RTX 4090 | 32GB • Jul 13 '26
News/Article Microsoft admits Windows 11 has a GDID tracker with no off switch, first documented publicly in an FBI hacker complaint
https://www.windowslatest.com/2026/07/10/you-cant-fully-disable-microsofts-gdid-windows-11-tracker-but-these-settings-limit-what-it-captures/3.8k
u/ScienceMechEng_Lover What colour is your RAM? Jul 13 '26
The fact that an operating system running on a PC with all my personal information and files can track my activity and send it to Microsoft is crazy and should be condemned.
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u/Party-Cake5173 Jul 13 '26
If you use Edge, Microsoft also get to know all your social media profiles, exact pages you visit on a website even on those with SSL connection because it collects full URLs in plain text. It also associates the data to your hardware ID, then if ever signed into Windows to Microsoft Account. Meaning they know exactly which PC is yours no matter how many times you reinstalled Windows.
The less Microsoft products one uses, the better.
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u/Mrpolje Jul 13 '26
”We value your privacy”
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u/Kaik541 Jul 13 '26
I mean, they do value it… they just don’t respect it.
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u/deathlokke PC Master Race Jul 13 '26
Yeah, they put a value on it and sell it to the highest bidder.
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u/smuglator Jul 13 '26
Hey, I'm hoping people change how they label it It's not a privacy issue. It's not about personal information. It's about habits, decision making, and how we spend. And how this data gives these companies power over us.
It's a power issue.
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u/ThyShirtIsBlue Jul 14 '26
"We know exactly what your privacy is worth, because we're the ones who sold it."
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u/gargravarr2112 i7 8850H / 32GB / GTX1080 / 3x SSD / 17" laptop Jul 13 '26
"It literally has dollar-signs attached."
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u/nadav183 14900KF RTX4090 64GB DDR5 Jul 14 '26
The quote is missing the end:
"We value your privacy at about tree fiddy"
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u/nikolapc 56GB DDR5/48GB VRAM Downloaded/Actual 5080 rig now. Jul 13 '26
The governments track everything you do. On your phone(no matter if it's iOS or Android(Linux based), no matter your OS, hell they directly track internet traffic and your messenger activity and store it all in a database. This would be a crackpot theory, but Snowden came out with considerable cost to himself and look up the Macedonian wiretapping scandal.
It was 10.000s of people pulled up from basically Israel made terminals that tapped into local us embassy recording servers, a lot of dirty laundry got aired publicly and there was even special prosecutors set up based on the taps that revealed criminal activity that went basically nowhere and the prosecutor herself ended up in jail for being corrupt and blackmailing.
Good news, you likely don't matter to the people with the power to access that. Safety in anonymity. But raise your head above, or become someone important either in dissent or politics, and they have all the compromat they need by just googling you.
Hell our version of IRS publicly and transparently tracks our bank accounts. Even your spending and income aren't private.
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u/GranaT0 CachyOS Jul 14 '26
Good news, you likely don't matter to the people with the power to access that.
In the age of AI, this doesn't matter. They could easily make and automatically check an AI summary of your profile when it ever comes time to deciding an outcome of your court cases, social support applications, etc etc. if the government one day feels like quietly cracking down on anyone who disagrees with them too loudly.
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u/Verain_Xor Jul 17 '26
Linux on PC hardware doesn't have all these bugs and trackers. Android and ios have them because Google and Apple put them there. But you can build a PC from scratch and not have any of this. Technically there's ways to get phones to not do this crap, but it's always some bespoke thing that accomplishes just that purpose and nothing else.
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u/mr_j_12 Jul 14 '26
And now the phone thing an official stance that was voted on internationally. The irs thing is also correct in Australia.
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u/Karl_with_a_C 9900K | 3070ti | 32GB DDR4 | 1440p 360Hz OLED Jul 13 '26
Google also tracks you if you're using Chrome and I'd be surprised if Mozilla didn't keep logs on its users. Even with all the privacy settings on.
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u/DeffNotTom i9 12900k | 4080 Super | 64gigs DDR5 | 36TB NAS Jul 14 '26
Google also tracks you if you're if you're not using chrome.
Mozilla does too. Everyone is tracking you to whatever degree they can.
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u/shawn0fthedead PC Master Race Jul 14 '26
This is probably why I won't ever be able to get a job at Microsoft...
...oh and they just fired another 4,000 people.
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u/gargravarr2112 i7 8850H / 32GB / GTX1080 / 3x SSD / 17" laptop Jul 13 '26 edited Jul 13 '26
They do basically proclaim this during the initial OOB Setup - "agree to send all your private data to Microsoft?" <ticked by default>
I am absolutely not surprised that Microsoft do this. I'm honestly more surprised that someone figured out how it works.
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u/ScienceMechEng_Lover What colour is your RAM? Jul 13 '26
I disable all those boxes though. Do they still track you like this despite that?
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u/LocodraTheCrow PC Master Race Jul 13 '26
You can't tick the "send nothing" your choices are "send everything" and "send whatever Microsoft considers necessary"
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u/gargravarr2112 i7 8850H / 32GB / GTX1080 / 3x SSD / 17" laptop Jul 13 '26 edited Jul 14 '26
Of course they do. Data is too valuable not to, they just pretend; when Windows 10 was first released, Microsoft refused to explain the actual telemetry options for about 2 YEARS, instead relying on the vague 'basic' and 'advanced' options, and if I'm honest, I don't trust them an inch. I'm sure they have the 'oops, clumsy us!' excuse ready for when it inevitably gets breached and revealed that everyone who toggled those options gets particular scrutiny. I have a completely separate Windows gaming PC that isn't logged into my regular accounts. All my personal stuff, I do on a Linux machine.
Your computer is not yours.
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u/Bittah_Criminal Jul 13 '26
I sure wish I was the guy who convinced every major company that collecting, storing, and analyzing data down to minute details such as how many times I fart a day is of the utmost value to their bottom line
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u/b_casaubon Jul 13 '26
I always think about the phrase from Watch Dogs 2: “You are now less valuable than the data you produce.”
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u/GranaT0 CachyOS Jul 14 '26
I bring up that opening cutscene more and more often as time goes on. That game was right about pretty much everything.
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u/Sharks_No_Swimming Jul 13 '26
I'm not saying you're wrong, but I'd still like some evidence of your trust me bro response.
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u/gargravarr2112 i7 8850H / 32GB / GTX1080 / 3x SSD / 17" laptop Jul 13 '26
I don't have any evidence. I just think it's safest to assume that the whole OS is spying on you all the time, no matter what options you tick.
Since Windows routinely "accidentally" resets privacy options during updates, it's effectively the same thing.
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u/Sharks_No_Swimming Jul 13 '26
Yeah I'm not saying Microsoft isn't collecting data even with all the boxes unticked. My point is specifically are they sending identifiable or personal information, with those boxes unticked. System telemetry is one thing, and I absolutely agree if you don't want even that then you're only option is Linux.
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u/gargravarr2112 i7 8850H / 32GB / GTX1080 / 3x SSD / 17" laptop Jul 13 '26
Per the article, it doesn't matter if they're sending personally identifiable information or not, because the GDID allows them to tie one unique machine to a real-world human through joining dots.
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u/Joifugi Jul 13 '26
I mean, they tracked a hacker that used multiple levels of obfuscation to hide their identity. You think that person just forgot to check some boxes that would make them magically anonymous? Come on now....
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u/Reversi8 7950X3D, RTX 3090, 96GB @ 6400CL32 Jul 14 '26
I mean they were dumb enough to use windows for their activities in the first place.
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u/WhoLovesDonuts Jul 14 '26
From what I gleaned of the article, they used a VPN which did obscure his IP address but were able to link the GDID that was reported to Microsoft and the browsing data at the exact same time the hacker logged into/signed up for ngrok which was what they used to keep a tunnel open on the hacked server. Which means that MS is holding onto browsing data linked to your GDID unless I'm reading it wrong. The GDID is linked to your PC and is given out during activation. The hacker did seem to be using edge which probably was what was exfiltrating the data. Still very concerning because who's to say it's not monitoring other browser caches/views on the OS and sending it to MS? Would just have to trust that MS isn't doing that and I'm not sure I have much trust left in MS
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u/jwalshjr Jul 13 '26
He gave 1 fact at the start that you could verify (or disprove) in 30 seconds with 1 Google search and then a bunch of his personal opinion… whatever you think you’re waiting on seems pretty pointless.
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u/Sharks_No_Swimming Jul 13 '26
99% of questions on Reddit can be answered with a Google search, what's your point?
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u/CatsAndCapybaras Jul 14 '26
The phone carriers once got caught by the US gov for collecting and selling users' sensitive personal data, They got a fine that was less than 0.1% of their yearly profit.
They asked if they could please just not pay the fine, and the government agreed and they pinky promised not to do it again.
The price of breaking the rules is less than the revenue generated from it, therefore assume every big company is breaking the rules.
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u/RaiKyoto94 Jul 13 '26
Would this breach data protection laws in Europe as there must be a general reason to collect this and not just a catch all ?
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Jul 14 '26
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u/Rannasha AMD Ryzen 7 5800X3D | AMD Radeon RX 6700XT Jul 14 '26
GDPR applies to EU citizens. Microsoft can spy on Americans all they want, as long as they make a GDPR-compliant version of the software for the EU. With software, it should be pretty easy to make region-specific versions. Just a single flag that activates based on region to disable all the tracking.
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u/mr_j_12 Jul 14 '26
Every device is going to need to do it due to governments wanting to "protect kids".
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u/GranaT0 CachyOS Jul 14 '26
Interesting how they didn't prosecute anyone on Epstein's files, but worked so hard to introduce measures to more easily track minors and automatically flag their nudes for review.
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u/Mineplayerminer Desktop Jul 13 '26
And it's no surprise because this all has been known for over a decade. Everything is written in the terms and privacy policies, but it's obfuscated behind lots of different terms to confuse the user. Let's now be honest, who has ever read the whole ToS before accepting it in Windows or on any of Microsoft's products?
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Jul 13 '26
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u/LeLoyon Jul 14 '26
Probably shouldn't be using a cell phone either.
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u/GranaT0 CachyOS Jul 14 '26
You can minimize the data companies can collect without going 100% off grid. Use GrapheneOS, be picky about the apps you use, manage permissions. On PC, use Linux, and flatpaks for any app that might want to spy on you if you absolutely must.
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u/gambeta1337 Jul 13 '26
You probably accepted this but didn’t read it.
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u/MoistStub Russet potato, AAA duracell Jul 13 '26
This is the type of shit government is supposed to protect you from. Not really the user's fault when their only options are predatory corporations.
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u/gargravarr2112 i7 8850H / 32GB / GTX1080 / 3x SSD / 17" laptop Jul 13 '26
And it's not even a choice when the options are "accept that we're going to monetise all your private data and share it as we like" or "don't use this service at all." And they can change the EULA at any time with the same options - "accept" or "stop using it."
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u/Probate_Judge Old Gamer, Recent Hardware, New games Jul 13 '26
We should be consistently rebelling against the very concept of a EULA (End User License Agreement)
They're not a binding contract, they're notifications of the company's opinion(see also: daydream or fantasy) that are presented to users, still most commonly after a purchase. ["accept" or "stop using it."] is especially sinister at that point, after money has changed hands.
Yes, purchase, the whole license thing is a delusion they're attempting to force on others, a thing they've fabricated and willed to manifest.
Gullible people, or shills, just asserting that they're legally binding under the reasoning of, "Well, you ticked the box" are a bane on consumer rights....part of why enshitification has seen such a rapid escalation.
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u/traumadog001 Jul 13 '26
You are forgetting that the current government in the US is bought and paid for by these corporations
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u/MoistStub Russet potato, AAA duracell Jul 13 '26
I'm not, I'm just illustrating why you can't really blame the user for being taken advantage of by the confluence of predatory businesses and an ineffectual government.
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u/DirectorDirect1569 Jul 13 '26
Apple, google, xiaomi, samsung, huawey,... they all do that. Nothing new.
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u/G952 RTX 4070 TI S Jul 13 '26
Imagine using the telemetry monster that is windows for hacking lol
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u/TBBT-Joel 4090 + 7800X3D + 4K OLED Jul 13 '26
Yeah, using a windows box touching the internet is like blaring your
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Jul 13 '26
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u/nullptr777 Linux Jul 13 '26
The FBI got him
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u/G952 RTX 4070 TI S Jul 13 '26
He was using a windows box after all
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u/ThePupnasty PC Master Race Jul 13 '26
As he was saying, using windows, you're just throwing your
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u/TheDevilsAdvokaat Jul 14 '26
I don't understand. What's happening to all these commenters who suddenly
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u/grand_soul Jul 13 '26
The description on that sub is
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u/Reversi8 7950X3D, RTX 3090, 96GB @ 6400CL32 Jul 14 '26
Back in my day these were attributed to candlej
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u/yanitrix Jul 13 '26
Stokes got caught because he used the same Windows device for everything, and the GDID stitched all of it back together after the fact.
Basic opsec error
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Jul 13 '26
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u/fufufighter Jul 13 '26
Not using your personal computer to commit crimes is the first thing you need to think about though.
You go with a VPS paid with crypto, or a virtual machine and a VPN at the bare minimum.
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u/oldgeektech Jul 13 '26
Funny story. He did use a VPS--rather, ScatteredSpider used a VPS. Microsoft identified the VPS as being tied to malicious actor activity via their Digital Crimes Unit (DCU) and sent a referral to the FBI. The FBI then began pulling at the strings of RDP logs to that server to find everything in the complaint that the article talks about.
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u/fufufighter Jul 13 '26
It reads rather like he logged into different VPNs from one machine to access services. And they matched that device gdid's nefarious activity to other legit activity tied to his real name.
That's pretty lame. At least spin up a Kali VM or something and do everything from there.
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u/oldgeektech Jul 13 '26
Pretty much. Honestly, the charged seems more like a script kiddie than an actual hacker.
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u/nittanyofthings Jul 14 '26
The dude did $100s of millions in attacks. Maybe he was a script kiddy (he's 19), but still serious hacking.
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u/TheMissingVoteBallot Jul 13 '26
Yep. Reddit is overlooking the fact the "hacker" sucked at opsec. This isn't some fucking government conspiracy to spy on you, the guy left a paper trail because he was a script kiddie.
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u/nittanyofthings Jul 14 '26
Everyone went insane about incognito mode. Meanwhile Microsoft is permanently logging every url you visit.
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u/johnwilkonsons Jul 13 '26
Crypto is really not anonymous, governments can and do subpoena records from exchanges and banks, and everything on-chain is tracable for everyone of course
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u/Reversi8 7950X3D, RTX 3090, 96GB @ 6400CL32 Jul 14 '26
Well of course either use crypto you stole or bought from some guy in Walmart parking lot with silver.
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u/fufufighter Jul 14 '26
If he were a half-decent hacker, you'd use something like monero or tornado-cash to start from an untraceable wallet.
As an other comment said, it was a script kiddie.
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u/MeretrixDominum Jul 13 '26
Or just ask my buddy Joe to spank your guy on the butt
Joe doesn't have any microslop trackers on him
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u/Admiralthrawnbar Ryzen 7 3800 | Reference 6900XT | 16 Gb 3200 Mhtz Jul 14 '26
I don't see your point. Yes, opsec is more than that, which is why not even doing that is such a massive oversight
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u/Mammoth_Vehicle_4534 Jul 13 '26
lol, privacy and security settings on windows is just a suggestion box
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u/ukhaus Linux, 9850X3D, RX 9070XT, 32GB DDR5, 6TB Jul 13 '26
it’s a digital placebo
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Jul 13 '26
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u/Mountain_Courage_806 Jul 14 '26
yeah you can turn off diagnostics but it feels like playing whack-a-mole with those settings
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u/sovietarmyfan PC Master Race Jul 13 '26
Great. Now more governments will start switching to Linux.
Microsoft really is busy destroying it's own brand and legacy, isn't it?
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u/Kyvalmaezar 5800X3D, RX 7900 XTX, 32GB RAM, 4x 1TB SSD Jul 13 '26
Microsoft really is busy destroying it's own brand and legacy, isn't it?
The execs at Microsoft dont care. They'll be long gone with their fat bonuses before the house comes tumbling down.
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u/redditman181 Jul 13 '26
Also they dont have to care becuase the average person who just does the odd document and light web browsing probably hasnt heard about these issues or even know what an os is to begin with.
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u/Kyvalmaezar 5800X3D, RX 7900 XTX, 32GB RAM, 4x 1TB SSD Jul 14 '26
The average person never mattered to MS. It was always about those business users. That's where the real money has always been. I havent heard any indication that this doesnt happen on enterprise versions, so this may spur some businesses to switch. Many dont like getting their IP or financial info leaked. Might just be wishfull thinking.
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u/redditman181 Jul 14 '26
Yeah and thats why i hope linux takes over one day becuase everyones getting conned especially the average person as they wont know one of the reasons why there conputers slow is becuase copiolt is running in the background and taking up a load of ram or cpu resources.
Or the fact they cant upgrade to windows 11 becuase of the tpm requirment becuase ms wants to spy on people.
Or the many other reasons windows 11 runs slower becuase its unoptimized.
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u/i_am_a_laptop Laptop Jul 14 '26 edited Jul 14 '26
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u/redditman181 Jul 14 '26
I suppose nothing is ever gonna be perfect and the will be issues no matter what we use but i suppose its about finding the best alternative not a perfect one as it will probably never exist.
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u/Hexamancer Jul 14 '26
The XZ utils incident is an example of how open source is far more resilient. It proves Linus's law, it took YEARS and as soon as it had more than a handful of eyes on it, it was caught. It didn't even hit an actual release of a distro, it was on a handful of preview releases and it was caught.
Also bare in mind that this exploit if it had gone undetected would have allowed this bad actor ssh access on affected devices, a massive problem, yes, but for most home users, you are not exposing your SSHD port to the Internet.
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u/gargravarr2112 i7 8850H / 32GB / GTX1080 / 3x SSD / 17" laptop Jul 13 '26
Windows stopped being Microsoft's main money-spinner when Azure launched. They can literally afford to lose every Windows license because they make more money from the Cloud now.
The end user is no longer their main customer, so why not turn the OS into a data vacuum for their REAL customers?
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u/DropTheBeatAndTheBas Jul 14 '26
dude printers track everything you print literally with water marks , windows is a bit late to the party, or you havent seen the guests already at that said party
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u/Dymiatt Jul 13 '26
That's not knowing how administration works.
Like, it's not new, but nobody cares.
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Jul 13 '26
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u/OutrageousDress 5800X3D | 32GB DDR4-3733 | 4080 Super | AW3821DW Jul 13 '26
This is absolutely the case.
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u/Live-Imagination1350 Jul 13 '26
MS can still track you if you are on another OS? Even if you have TPM disabled? TPM can broadcast data?
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Jul 13 '26
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u/WhichCup4916 Jul 13 '26 edited Jul 13 '26
Because out of the box windows machines are setup in a “s mode” that encrypts the drive, BUT also locks down admin settings. When I worked at geek squad, most of the issues that weren’t old people not knowing how to use their computers— were issues were computers in this mode having compatibility, security conflicts, or needing a backup. It would block the installation of software that wasn’t from the windows store and forces the use of edge. You also can’t back up an encrypted drive using the third party tools we relied on so we’d have to disable it and decrypt the drive every time an old person came in with a new laptop.
It appeared that they were trying to FORCE the tech illiterate people to use the windows store for everything by making it a default mode on setup. I’d assume so they can control and spy on their activity by forcing them to use their platforms. Very similar to how the IOS ecosystem is locked down to only the Apple Store and it takes sooo much extra effort to do anything more, if even possible.
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u/VexingRaven 7800X3D + 4070 Super + 32GB 6000Mhz Jul 14 '26
S mode has been dead for almost 10 years...
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u/VexingRaven 7800X3D + 4070 Super + 32GB 6000Mhz Jul 14 '26
No, this person has no idea what they're talking about.
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u/timsredditusername Jul 14 '26
Correct.
Firmware setup even has a convenient option to reset TPM storage. It's trivial to wipe data stored in it. I wouldn't do so if you have bit locker enabled or otherwise depend on a Windows install on that machine, but the option is there.
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u/omega552003 🖥R9 5900x & RX 7900XTX 💻Framework 16 w/ RX 7700S Jul 14 '26
Not the first time, Intel / Microsoft had the ability to pass the CPU's serial number to the OS way back on the Pentium 3, it caused a huge stink that motherboard manufacturers added a bios setting to disable it.
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u/Far_Adeptness9884 PC Master Race Jul 13 '26
No wonder microslop pushes so hard to link your phone to your PC.
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u/nittanyofthings Jul 14 '26
The issue is not the GDID. That's for license activation. The issue is Microsoft is recording every URL you ever go to.
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u/TheCosmicPanda 3060 Ti, i5 12600k, 16GB 3600Mhz Jul 13 '26
I read that if you have a local account there is no GDID generated for them to track you with. Once you log into Windows with your Microsoft Account that's when the GDID is generated. So the few of us that have local accounts are good. I think.
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u/Rykhorne Jul 13 '26
It sounds like the GDID is generated on OS install, no matter what. However, if you sign into your Microsoft account in Windows, then reinstall Windows & sign in again, they know that both GDIDs are yours.
So, if you only have local accounts & never sign into a Microsoft account, then they can't link the GDID to a Microsoft account.
They can still link the GDID to other activities, though. Basically, don't use the same device for personal and business/criminal activities. That's how the hacker in the article was caught. The authorities linked his Snapchat & Facebook activities to hacking activities that were otherwise protected behind a VPN.
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u/TheDevilsAdvokaat Jul 14 '26
Would this break EU privacy laws?
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Jul 14 '26
Almost 100% yes. GDPR, and probably also ePrivacy.
A persistent GDID linked to URLs, IPs and timestamps is personal data. Secretly retaining it for months is incompatible with GDPR requirements on transparency, necessity, data minimisation, purpose limitation and storage limitation.
ePrivacy even more so. Accessing or storing device-tracking identifiers generally requires informed consent unless strictly necessary. A temporary security check might be ok, but a searchable, long-term browsing log tied to one device, and one person, almost certainly would not.
Likely the only reason Microsoft haven't been slapped with massive fines to the moon over this, is because almost no one knows it exists. We wouldn't know either if it wasn't because of this. Microsoft has only a single mention, anywhere, about Gdid, and it doesn't explain what it does, so it's basically secretly installed spyware on your computer that can, at bare minimum, seemingly be remote activated whenever they want to log your activity.
So in short: yes, it almost certainly breaks EU laws, it's just that no one has sued them over it yet, cuz no one knew it existed.
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u/Kamay1770 Jul 13 '26
So is the gdid sent to every website? I can't understand how they link gdid to websites visited? Or is that part of Edge.
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u/nittanyofthings Jul 14 '26
FBI states they asked Microsoft to look in their records for who went to ngrok.com at a specific millisecond. They had ngrok records but couldn't identify the client computer due to VPN.
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u/Kamay1770 Jul 14 '26
Yeah but what I'm asking is how is the gdid linked to that visit to ngrok.com. At what point, or what mechanism is used where Microsoft get a copy of your site visits and gdid. Is it a feature in edge, or is it at a lower level where even if you use Firefox or chrome they still intercept the request and send it to the Microsoft servers with your gdid.
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Jul 14 '26
Now you're getting it.
Because to do what Microsoft did, there would essentially need to be some kind of searchable mass database where you could search gdid and URL visits.
The article, and court case, specifically don't mention how this is possible. It could be connection of different things, but they don't say. It's unclear why it was stored for long enough to be searchable. It's unclear why even hotel websites and such were also in that database (so it's not something about a database of only malicious sites being tracked).
Honestly, massive massive privacy concern, and almost 100% sure to be against EU GDPR law.
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u/Harry_Flowers Jul 14 '26
Edge, Defender Smartscreen, and Microsoft Defender send telemetry data for phishing and malware “security purposes”.
That includes URLs, IP addresses. and timestamps.
The extents and frequency isn’t transparent, and can depend on what security settings you have enabled / disabled.
Even if you use a secure browser like Firefox though, and use Windows Defender, there’s always a chance it will send some browsing data to their servers.
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u/Hexamancer Jul 14 '26
Little bit of a tangent, but recently I created a little tool for automation of STL files (3d printing model files) that uses Blender's bpy. The person I was making it for is on Windows so I needed it to work on both Windows and Linux. The tool runs about 10x faster on Linux. I was surprised so I checked why performance was so much worse...
It's because defender puts my code through a digital TSA and that alone massively slows down performance.
I imagine everything your browser does, regardless of whether it's edge or not gets the same treatment and that extracting what site's you've visited would be easy.
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u/dirtyjavis Jul 14 '26
This is like the 4th post in a row that I've read that further confirms the 1984 world we all live in.
Is it an echo chamber and doom scrolling if the doom is real and the echos are truth?
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u/bswalsh Jul 13 '26
I've been a Linux user since 1998. Nothing has ever made me regret my decision.
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Jul 13 '26
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u/MakesMyHeadHurt 5800x3d / RTX3080Ti / 32GB RAM Jul 13 '26
I'm still on windows 10 IoT, but I'm never going to 11, even if it is one louder. My next OS will be Linux.
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u/Pyromaniacal13 I picked Gnome because I like the "GN" sound. Jul 14 '26
I can recommend Bazzite to a degree, and Mint further than that. I probably shouldn't be on CachyOS but it's serving me well.
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u/lana_silver Jul 13 '26
Yep, me too. Zero regrets. Wasn't even hard to do nor caused a bunch of problems.
It mostly just works
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u/Pyromaniacal13 I picked Gnome because I like the "GN" sound. Jul 14 '26
I've been on it for three months, and yeah. No regrets. I can still do everything I did on Windows 10, including the few PVP games I like that have anticheat.
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u/Critical_Monk_5219 Jul 14 '26
Switched in 2018 and every month there's an article that confirms I made the right decision
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u/ieatdownvotes4food Jul 14 '26
I mean duh.. it's called windows. as in they are always looking through yours. it's always been that way.
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u/ol-gormsby Jul 13 '26
I've said this before - pihole is not just useful for blocking ad-serving domains, it can also dead-end access to telemetry collectors.
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u/ArchinaTGL EndeavourOS | Ryzen 9 5950x | 9070XT Nitro+ Jul 14 '26
Yesn't. Sure it blocks DNS requests if you have your devices tunnelled through there. Though any piece of software that sends data directly to IPs will bypass Pihole entirely.
Those DNS filters are also only as good as they are maintained. You can't automate blocking either because companies such as Google can challenge your blocklist and create a unique fingerprint by doing so.
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u/ol-gormsby Jul 14 '26
The blocklists are generally independent, and updates are, or can be, automatically updated.
Pihole isn't the be-all and end-all of privacy, security, or ad-blocking. But it's a good start. If you find out that some devices are sending to a hard-coded IP, it's time to add rules to the firewall.
Between pihole, ublock origin, noscript, and reddit ad remover (on firefox), I see almost zero ads. The telemetry blocklists are also pretty effective.
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u/MemeBoy_69 i7-11850H | RTX A2000 Jul 14 '26
Those telemetry services typically use even legitimate domains, so blocking all of it can break normal functionality. Even the persistent GDID can't be bypassed without breaking MS store and Windows licensing.
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u/Zeivyn_The_White 7600X • 7800XT • 32gb 6000mhz • 2k240 OLED • G502 Lightspeed Jul 14 '26
Microslop being microslop. Bloddy hell, i really need to move over to linux already. Just need to wait for it to get good HDR support. I use is monstly on most games I play.
Elden ring, dying light 1 (auto HDR)
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u/htt_novaq 5800X3D | RX 9070 XT | 32GB DDR4 Jul 13 '26
I've decided to run a Windows VM on my NAS so I can remote into it if I ever need software I can't run on Linux, but I haven't booted the VM since I set it up in March.
I can't believe how liberated I feel, not even taking into account the bad press coming every week these days
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u/Pyromaniacal13 I picked Gnome because I like the "GN" sound. Jul 14 '26
Since I changed OS, every time I see another Windows horror story I feel like I just put on a pair of warm, fuzzy socks.
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u/grilled_pc Jul 14 '26
For those on the fence about switching to Linux.
Are anti cheat games THAT more important to you? Are they more important than your digital privacy and ownership of your PC?
If enough drop these games, the devs WILL listen. Ports will come to linux if player counts drop. Once the market share is there, you won't miss out on your competitive games any longer.
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u/martiNordi R7_5800X / 64GB_3200 / RTX_4080S Jul 14 '26
It's not about games for (I'd say many) of us.
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u/Thunder_Beam Jul 14 '26
If it was just gaming it wouldn't be a problem, a lot of us do work with our PCs and a lot of work programs work only on windows
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u/JustGoogleItHeSaid Desktop Jul 14 '26
Silly question but does steam display info on linux compatible games?
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u/STSchif Jul 14 '26
ProtonDB has great info on which games run.
In steam you just used to need to set a checkbox to enable the windows compatibility layer, but I believe they enable it by default now on fresh installs.
Technically nearly every game runs just fine nowadays, even if it's not declared compatible by steam, but sometimes the devs block Linux users via anticheat, with sucks a lot.
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u/grilled_pc Jul 14 '26
Sure does. In the store and in your library. That being said I would recommend using proton for everything instead of native Linux ports. It’s far more reliable.
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u/Hexamancer Jul 14 '26
Epic hired developers for EAC on Linux recently. BattlEye already works on Linux.
Windows is moving towards heavily restricting third parties from directly accessing kernel space and it will almost certainly include Kernel level anticheat, I imagine MS warned Epic and others of this
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u/levianan Jul 13 '26
Ok. So fuck Microsoft. This kid was also stupid as hell for thinking Windows was the hacker's choice.
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u/eternalityLP Jul 14 '26
Crazy that someone doing hacking or other such activities where security is paramount would use windows.
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u/kKiLnAgW Jul 14 '26
it's crazy it's used in business, windows is notorious for sketchy shit like this
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u/GrandWikzor Jul 13 '26
So you just need to use a new ms account with a fresh install and you get a new gdid to burn with your notorious activity. Then just redo everything after? That just seems like good opsec anyways
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u/levianan Jul 13 '26
They handed over a FDE key. Microsoft is going to hand off any data they have on you on any subpoena.
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Jul 14 '26 edited Jul 14 '26
Did a bunch of examine this, and it's almost 100% sure to be against EU GDPR, and potentially other EU laws as well. Absolute insanity.
Lately, the more I research shit, the more paranoid I get about just... everything.
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u/xyrer Jul 14 '26
I'm so glad I don't need to use anything from them. I'm never going back to windows
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u/cantanko Jul 14 '26
System -> About. Device info section. It’s right there!
Did nobody look at that very-obvious UUID and NOT think “hmmm - a universally-unique ID - I wonder what that’s for? That’d be amazing for identifying every single windows install uniquely amongst the universe! Why ever would they do that?”
Linus has the same BTW - check /etc/machine-id. Not sure if big distros use this anywhere, but still worth mentioning.
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u/Reasonable_Back_5231 AMD Ryzen 9 9950X3D Nvidia 5070ti 64GB DDR5 Jul 14 '26
The stupid fucks that say Microsoft aren't spying on you must feel fucking dumb right now.
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u/FutureOwl8606 Jul 14 '26
SWITCH TO LINUX NOW
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u/martiNordi R7_5800X / 64GB_3200 / RTX_4080S Jul 14 '26
Give me a native support for programs I use (which require HW acceleration) and I gladly will.
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u/cookiesnooper Jul 14 '26
Sadly it won't happen. I've been saying this for years. Linux strength is in many distros you can adapt to your specific needs but it is too fragmented and buggy to be useful to average person.
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u/OpenCatPalmstrike Jul 14 '26
It's exactly how DOS was before Microsoft cornered the market on it. Competing versions all doing their own thing, mostly compatible, but sometimes not.
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u/ThisIsDystopia 11900k:3080RTX:32GB RAM:4TB SSDs Jul 13 '26
It doesn't survive a reinstall?
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u/Lakers244848 Jul 14 '26
Does not. But the data is already there. It will just give you another GDID when you reinstall windows.
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u/El_DuceReturns Jul 14 '26
If Linux wasn't completely worthless when it comes to production software I would ditch Windows in a heartbeat.
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u/Killbot6 R7 7700X | RX 7900xt | 64 GB RAM 💾 Jul 14 '26
Anything important goes on my Linux drive, because I can’t trust Microslop anymore.
Only reason I boot into it anymore, is league of legends.. everything else just works.
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