For those who don't know, Microsoft Recall is a system that screenshots what you do every few seconds, and uses OpenAI's vision api to allow search on eveything you did in the past.
Is this why a new privacy setting quietly turned up called "Activity history"?
> "Activity history: Jump back into what you were doing on your device by storing your activity history, including info about websites you browse and how you use apps and services. Review the Learn more and Privacy Statement to find out how Microsoft products and services use this data to personalize experiences while respecting your privacy"
"Copilot" also quietly turned up on my Windows 10 taskbar not long ago. I certainly didn't opt to install it.
Copilot first appeared in my taskbar after an update as a pinned app, which I promptly I unpinned.
Another update not long after it appeared again in my taskbar, this time not as a pinned app icon, but it literally replaced my "show desktop" button in the bottom right corner! I had to search online for other confused people looking to restore a basic desktop navigation feature that's been around since like 2009, because they replaced it with the 17th ever-present option to jump into their preinstalled bloatware!
And just as a sidenote, Microsoft Copilot is by far the worst LLM I've tried to use, both in how dumb it is, but also in how infuriating it is when it gets stuff wrong while spamming a bunch of stupid emojis into every sentence like it's excited about how confidently stupid it is.
Frankly I don't understand why anybody would be surprised over this. They have been doing this stuff for over a decade? (I specifically mean quietly introducing privacy-hostile settings without user consent or knowledge, not other user-hostile stuff that's been going on for much longer).
O&O's "ShutUp10" [1] used to be able to disable as apposed to remove this as of July 16th. Did they change it so it can't be disabled any more? If so is there a way to put an arrow in it's knee such as mounting a ram disk overlay where it stores data or creating a scheduled task that runs in the same security scope to truncate files?
Windows Recall doesn’t use OpenAI or any online API. The indexing and OCR is done by a local model, in a Secure Enclave powered by VBS and encrypted with the system TPM. AKA: a virtualization-separated process with storage inaccessible to the OS (all lookup etc. is done over RPC).
No, that scheme would be too hard to contain so the three letter agencies are blatant about it. They just let tech companies develop these things and know they'll have access to the data anyway.
For every real user that finds a tool slurping up data to be useful, there are 100 law enforcement agents also saying it's useful so everyone should hop on the bandwagon.
Proton is able to run just about anything now, not just games. Stop using Microsoft Operating Systems where you can and mark them as needing replacement with real software in all your reports.
From my experience, it's still not a 100% replacement. For example, there are no drivers for a pretty common steering wheel (Logitech G923). There is a driver for an older version of the wheel that kind of works, but no TRUEFORCE support. And even then, you have to mess with some low level details to make it work, send magic values to the hardware on plugging it in.
I also noticed that games from Steam end up taking up substantially more disk space to the point where I can have only a few games installed on Linux.
And even the games without any special hardware dongles don't work so well as you imply.
I am new to steering wheels-not sure if this is the exact version because they mention xbox)? Try a distro with a very recent kernel (6.11; like Nobara for a gaming focused distro).
> I also noticed that games from Steam end up taking up substantially more disk space to the point where I can have only a few games installed on Linux.
Shouldn't be substantially more disk space. Would you provide stats?
Proton makes a Windows environment for each game as it installs those 3rd party libraries in the environment and that is used for disk calculations, while on Windows those libraries may be installed directly to the OS. Each 3rd party library and the shader cache is stored separately. This is my guess-I do not work on Proton.
> And even the games without any special hardware dongles don't work so well as you imply.
Anticheat and a few obscure Windows libraries are an issue. River City Girls needs some media foundation library or it does not show cutscenes. Valve is working on them.
I still don't get why wheels even need drivers at this point. It's 2024 and even with a legit version of Windows, there are all kinds of problems with all different wheels and all different games. We have a couple of axes and a bunch of buttons and some feedback. Steering wheels have been around for at least 30 years.
And if you DO have a driver, why does the fucking game have to have a list of supported steering wheels? Shouldn't that be abstracted away from the game? Isn't that the whole point of all those gaming and device APIs that Microsoft has built?
The experience with racing games isn't great on Windows, it's going to be worse on Linux where manufacturers put exactly zero investment into making it work and the crossover between sim racers and Linux developers is very small.
> From my experience, it's still not a 100% replacement
if it were a perfect replacemente, there would be no Windows.
for some it's good enough to endure the rough spots.
if you want to replace Windows and give yourself a gray area, and you can afford it, get a computer with 2 gpus and use a VM with VFIO and looking glass and you can contain its naughtiness away while enojoying it at native speed for gaming or whatever you want at 4k@120hz in a window or fullscreen inside Linux.
I recently set up my gaming rig dual booting Win 10 and Linux. I've spent almost all of my time in the Linux side, and when Win 10 is EOL I am no longer dual booting - Windows can live in a GPU passthrough VM under Linux with only Steam and whatever Windows software won't run under Proton/Wine.
Windows can see what I want it to see and not the whole machine. It has completely broken my trust.
I run it on Linux everyday with Steam on Proton. It is my go to game on steamdeck and my Fedora desktop.
By default steam wants to download the old old old Linux version that doesn't allow online play, but if you enable proton it will download the Windows version and run fine. I am pretty sure it doesn't have a real anti-cheat included.
I'm pretty sure Fusion360 is built with QT tool kit for the GUI, and uses Python for the scripting engine. Of any of the modern professional paid 3D CAD programs, it seems to be the least tethered to Windows. It would be nice if they released a proper Linux version, like Autodesk does for some of their art industry programs. NX used to have a UNIX GUI recently, but it would take a pretty major company to move off Windows to bring that back.
Solidworks made its name by being the first mainstream CAD built for Windows back when all the other 3D CAD was running UNIX workstations that cost more than a new pickup truck. Both Solidworks, and the Autodesk competitor to it, Inventor, are Windows API through and through. It is disappointing, but unsurprising that they don't do well in WINE. They went all in on Windows to their core from the very start.
Valve Index. I currently dual-boot Windows for VR. This is the rabbit hole I went down (to be clear: SteamVR, specifically the compositor, is completely broken).
1. Install Monado with libsurvive.
2. Discover that libsurvive doesn't have the "smarts" that SteamVR has, and that calibration can be wonky (and was wonky for me).
3. Learn that you can import SteamVR calibration data. I can't do this in Linux because, well, SteamVR doesn't work.
4. Dual boot Windows with the intention to copy over calibration data.
Overall, if you are willing to deal with some annoyances, give it a try, it might cover your use cases.
SteamVR is playable, but not at Windows level and rough around the edges. I personally run an Index on a 4080 Super (previously 3080) via the SteamVR runtime. System details in case it matters: Arch Linux Zen kernel, X11 (i3), Nvidia drivers, SteamVR Beta, usually a recent Proton GE version. I remember playing Beat Saber, including modded [1], Until You Fall, Pistol Whip, Raw Data and After the Fall without issues. Non-steam applications outside Steam can also work, I have a launch script that sets up the env vars for Proton, should be easier via Lutris.
I see some problems however. VR itself is not as smooth as it should be, 100% playable, but not as smooth as I remember it ages ago on Windows or using a FOSS VR [4] stack (which has other issues). I don't really use SteamVR home, it sometimes takes a while to load. SteamVR window on the monitor has weird flickering issues, usually I can't get into its settings, likely i3 related. Firmware updates are mostly broken. No (I think) standby for the Lighthouses, I toggle them via Home Assistant and smart plugs.
Shout out to steamtinkerlaunch [2] for making certain settings easier to apply and ProtonDB [3] for tweaks if needed.
Does anyone know any good "debloat" scripts to disable all these modern features of Windows 11 and bring me back to something that resembles the Windows I grew up with?
I'm having a hard time keeping track of all of the registry keys and config settings I need to update to keep this crap at bay.
O&O ShutUp10++ is a requirement for me. It is my preference because every debloat script tends to legitimately break the OS. I have had to do clean installs multiple times this year after customers ran them. MS provides registry keys that can be configured, but they do consistently move them around. Without an application which can easily revert automated changes, it'd be nearly impossible to keep track of it all, let alone notice changes. Upside is not having a broken system, downside is needing to open it once every week or two. I agree with the other comments that LTSC would be better, but there's no reasonably legal way to obtain it, and nobody wants to have the BSA knock on their door asking for a quarter million USD per license violation. https://www.oo-software.com/en/shutup10
Not directed at you but I find it funny that people (rightfully!) complain about Microsoft spyware and then run some dubious scripts from who-knows-where. With the added side effects that these scripts always disable/remove waaaay too much and break the install which then lead to users cursing Microsoft for things that the user has broken without knowing.
I find it funny that on website called hacker news, it's still assumed that anyone who customizes their system must also be an idiot that knows nothing about being safe online.
I think it's a pretty damning condemnation of Microsoft's current product strategy, at least in relation to the user segment that visits hacker news.
People are willing to run highly privileged untrusted and unverified code in the personal computers, just for a chance to remove the stuff you're actively spending money and time developing.
Ultimately it's Microsoft not giving those users what they want. They have to accommodate the OS to fit their needs and sometimes it breaks.
It should be technically easy for Microsoft to decouple Recall from Explorer. I already saw this in the 90s with their web browser, coupled to the OS for purely commercial reasons.
I wouldn't say always. The last time I ran such a script, it didnt break anything. Granted, I did as the repo readme expressly and boldy stated, more than once, that 'anyone using this should read through the list of commands' (it was also nicely commented for lay people) and disable any sections related to services they use. Regardless, the defaults seemed quite sane and I even had to enable/uncomment a few for other services/products I didn't need.
key difference being - copilot and recall were added to my operating system without my consent - microsoft did not ask before they added these things, via windows update.
those dubious scripts from who-knows-where are run by me, with intent and with my consent, having passed whatever my own personal review process might be for that particular script.
If I try something and it turns out bad, that's on me, and I'm okay with that. If something is done to me without my knowledge or consent and it turns out bad, then that's a different story.
Just be aware that these "fixes" aren't 100% complete and will likely break in the future when Microsoft patches Windows. For example, when people tried to block telemetry in Windows 10 via the hosts file, Microsoft first moved the telemetry servers from named domains to a series of new IP addresses, then after a year or so they patched the telemetry sending code to bypass the hosts file. Similarly if you ran the scripts to disable Cortana/Windows Search, that worked for a while but nowadays you'll find SearchApp.exe doing Cortana work in the background whether you like it or not.
Being a dependency of explorer.exe implies that it can't be disabled. To explain further: explorer.exe is responsible for your task bar, start menu, etc.
Just disable Defender's real time scanning when you run the resultant script, otherwise it will protest. A lot. (Not just when you first run it, but the whole time.)
I find Gnome on stock Ubuntu pretty terrible for someone used to Windows, since workflows are different and you can't adjust anything.
KDE and Kubuntu are pretty close though. I'd never really considered fully switching to Linux a usable option before I found it, but I've been running it for a few years on my laptop and recently on my work pc, and once Win10 is EoL it'll probably be the only thing I still run on the rest of my machines. The nice side effect of bloated Electron apps is that at least now most things work on all platforms lmao.
I keep God Mode and a text file of all the reg settings... in case the porkchopolips arrives, which I was greeted with Monday morning. By early after noon, all was quiet again.
I recommend ALL these sites, and would only add Black Viper:
This is the first thing I run on any new Win 11 device/install and afterwards the OS just disappears into the background and doesn’t bother me one bit.
Incredible feeling of zen being able to scroll past the heated online Win 11 debates that don’t seem to apply to my day to day usage at all.
One of the things I've been trying to do since the advent of Windows 11 is ... get rid of 'Recommendations' on the Start Menu. It gives me the creeps to see stuff pop up there.
Whatever you do, the GPO / Registry key doesn't work on Non-Education / SE systems.
If you apply it on an Education version, the StartMenuShellExperienceHost (you may need to shuffle those words around) will read the settings. Nothing on my Workstation version.
Now, it MIGHT work if you push it through MDM, but MDMs cost money, and I haven't been able to find a self-hostable MDM that is up to date.
The "Recommendations" section is near-impossible to get rid of, but it's pretty easy to stop anything from displaying in that section.
Under Settings > Personalization > Start, I have "More pins" selected, and the various "Show whatever" options disabled, and my "Recommended" section is a single empty row at the bottom of the start menu that reads "To show your recent files and new apps, turn them on in the Settings."
I've used Chris' winutil https://github.com/ChrisTitusTech/winutil due to being open source and a powershell script, you can see everything it's doing there's no magic. The recommended update schedule change is something a lot of other programs miss out on imo
Additionally for O&O shut up fans, it has the option to launch that too within the script's GUI, as neither has to be installed to run
I know this technically applies to a lot of open source, but given the breadth of tools under the windows 'tweaking' category and the audience I'd expect to use these "magic wands to fix things you disagree with MS on" I'm really surprised there aren't more subtle trojans mixed in with them. I think it's extremely unlikely any significant amount of users examine the source or make sure a binary they're using is trustworthy, even assuming they know what to look for.
There's a lot of 'marketing' possible and a receptive audience whenever a big tech company pushes something like Copilot/Recall, and I'm sure a well timed or prompt 'quick and simple fix' tool release with some a time pressure could get a lot of installs.
massgrave's LTSC install has made it tolerable for me at least. The first time I booted into a standard consumer win11 install I nearly had an aneurysm
I recently made the switch to linux full time as well. Even small things, like my computer taking three seconds from clicking Shutdown to turning off, is such a relief compared to Win11.
Activation, introduced in Windows XP, is the main reason why I consider Windows 2000 the high water mark of Windows. The Windows NT lineup was truly no nonsense, no fuss. Unfortunately the merger of consumer-focused Windows (which used to be the 3.1/95/98/Me) lineup) and pro-focused Windows (which was the NT lineup plus Windows 2000) coincided with the introduction of many annoyances, starting with activation in Windows XP and later adding nagging prompts for updates and security-related things, telemetry, UI changes, and more.
Sadly even macOS has gotten more annoying over the years with its various nagging prompts.
What Windows 7 telemetry are you referring to? Other than WER, there was no telemetry in Windows 7 to my knowledge. There was an update a few years ago that back ported telemetry to Windows 7 right before the final stage of extended support and final EOL.
Back when Microsoft started pushing telemetry in Windows 10, they added additional telemetry to Windows 7 through updates. Not nearly as pervasive and omnipresent as with Windows 11, though; you can just remove the telemetry updates: https://gist.github.com/xvitaly/eafa75ed2cb79b3bd4e9
> To those that arrive here from any Youtube or Twitter posts, please know that disabling Recall via DISM works fine, and preserves the modern File Explorer (though some might consider this an anti-feature). CBS correctly disables it, and the disablement is preserved through reboots, just like with any other feature.
Also previous comment about the tool being updated:
> the latest commit to the draft PR now does the following. It leaves Recall enabled, but then it disables it on the first run. During my testing, it kept the explorer look intact
If people would like to "try Linux before you buy," check out DistroSea! It spins up a virtual machine of whatever distro and flavour you choose to try.
Readit News
There's an article from Sep 27th where they promise you'll be able to uninstall Recall: https://www.theverge.com/2024/9/27/24255721/microsoft-window... , not sure what that means for this explorer.exe dependency.
> "Activity history: Jump back into what you were doing on your device by storing your activity history, including info about websites you browse and how you use apps and services. Review the Learn more and Privacy Statement to find out how Microsoft products and services use this data to personalize experiences while respecting your privacy"
"Copilot" also quietly turned up on my Windows 10 taskbar not long ago. I certainly didn't opt to install it.
Another update not long after it appeared again in my taskbar, this time not as a pinned app icon, but it literally replaced my "show desktop" button in the bottom right corner! I had to search online for other confused people looking to restore a basic desktop navigation feature that's been around since like 2009, because they replaced it with the 17th ever-present option to jump into their preinstalled bloatware!
And just as a sidenote, Microsoft Copilot is by far the worst LLM I've tried to use, both in how dumb it is, but also in how infuriating it is when it gets stuff wrong while spamming a bunch of stupid emojis into every sentence like it's excited about how confidently stupid it is.
New is extra data collection and Copilot "understanding" your activities based on those records.
[1] - https://www.oo-software.com/en/shutup10
Source: https://blogs.windows.com/windowsexperience/2024/09/27/updat...
an hour? maybe two?
For every real user that finds a tool slurping up data to be useful, there are 100 law enforcement agents also saying it's useful so everyone should hop on the bandwagon.
it's supposed to be local. <------ YOU ARE HERE
you can supposedly disable it.
it's supposed not to send your information to the cops if it's sees you being naughty.
Yeah, you'll have to bring some sources for me to begin buying that. It goes totally against everything Microsoft and OpenAI have been pushing.
I also noticed that games from Steam end up taking up substantially more disk space to the point where I can have only a few games installed on Linux.
And even the games without any special hardware dongles don't work so well as you imply.
This is a nice, specific detail. Most of these comments are very vague.
> There is a driver for an older version of the wheel that kind of works
Do you mean an out of tree driver?
Would you test this and post back? The 6.3 kernel they mentioned 3 months ago is very old and likely a forked kernel.
https://www.reddit.com/r/linux_gaming/comments/vb0b37/g29g92...
I am new to steering wheels-not sure if this is the exact version because they mention xbox)? Try a distro with a very recent kernel (6.11; like Nobara for a gaming focused distro).
> I also noticed that games from Steam end up taking up substantially more disk space to the point where I can have only a few games installed on Linux.
Shouldn't be substantially more disk space. Would you provide stats?
Proton makes a Windows environment for each game as it installs those 3rd party libraries in the environment and that is used for disk calculations, while on Windows those libraries may be installed directly to the OS. Each 3rd party library and the shader cache is stored separately. This is my guess-I do not work on Proton.
> And even the games without any special hardware dongles don't work so well as you imply.
Anticheat and a few obscure Windows libraries are an issue. River City Girls needs some media foundation library or it does not show cutscenes. Valve is working on them.
And if you DO have a driver, why does the fucking game have to have a list of supported steering wheels? Shouldn't that be abstracted away from the game? Isn't that the whole point of all those gaming and device APIs that Microsoft has built?
The experience with racing games isn't great on Windows, it's going to be worse on Linux where manufacturers put exactly zero investment into making it work and the crossover between sim racers and Linux developers is very small.
if it were a perfect replacemente, there would be no Windows.
for some it's good enough to endure the rough spots.
if you want to replace Windows and give yourself a gray area, and you can afford it, get a computer with 2 gpus and use a VM with VFIO and looking glass and you can contain its naughtiness away while enojoying it at native speed for gaming or whatever you want at 4k@120hz in a window or fullscreen inside Linux.
Windows can see what I want it to see and not the whole machine. It has completely broken my trust.
0. https://helpx.adobe.com/photoshop/using/photoshop-web-faq.ht...
Adobe would be able to try a vertical integration play
Until then, I am dual booting.
By default steam wants to download the old old old Linux version that doesn't allow online play, but if you enable proton it will download the Windows version and run fine. I am pretty sure it doesn't have a real anti-cheat included.
Riot's Vanguard on the other hand, has unfortunately made it impossible to play LoL =c
Solidworks made its name by being the first mainstream CAD built for Windows back when all the other 3D CAD was running UNIX workstations that cost more than a new pickup truck. Both Solidworks, and the Autodesk competitor to it, Inventor, are Windows API through and through. It is disappointing, but unsurprising that they don't do well in WINE. They went all in on Windows to their core from the very start.
That's a huge show stopper for me at the moment and holding me back from switching over to Linux.
1. Install Monado with libsurvive.
2. Discover that libsurvive doesn't have the "smarts" that SteamVR has, and that calibration can be wonky (and was wonky for me).
3. Learn that you can import SteamVR calibration data. I can't do this in Linux because, well, SteamVR doesn't work.
4. Dual boot Windows with the intention to copy over calibration data.
5. Windows is installed. Give up and dual boot.
https://monado.freedesktop.org/libsurvive.html
If anyone else has had success, I would love to hear about it.
SteamVR is playable, but not at Windows level and rough around the edges. I personally run an Index on a 4080 Super (previously 3080) via the SteamVR runtime. System details in case it matters: Arch Linux Zen kernel, X11 (i3), Nvidia drivers, SteamVR Beta, usually a recent Proton GE version. I remember playing Beat Saber, including modded [1], Until You Fall, Pistol Whip, Raw Data and After the Fall without issues. Non-steam applications outside Steam can also work, I have a launch script that sets up the env vars for Proton, should be easier via Lutris.
I see some problems however. VR itself is not as smooth as it should be, 100% playable, but not as smooth as I remember it ages ago on Windows or using a FOSS VR [4] stack (which has other issues). I don't really use SteamVR home, it sometimes takes a while to load. SteamVR window on the monitor has weird flickering issues, usually I can't get into its settings, likely i3 related. Firmware updates are mostly broken. No (I think) standby for the Lighthouses, I toggle them via Home Assistant and smart plugs.
Shout out to steamtinkerlaunch [2] for making certain settings easier to apply and ProtonDB [3] for tweaks if needed.
[1] https://github.com/geefr/beatsaber-linux-goodies [2] https://github.com/sonic2kk/steamtinkerlaunch [3] https://www.protondb.com/ [4] https://monado.freedesktop.org/ https://lvra.gitlab.io/
If it can, I am switching to Linux immediately.
Is it something involving certified OpenGL drivers?
I'm having a hard time keeping track of all of the registry keys and config settings I need to update to keep this crap at bay.
I looked into it in 2018; turned out to be pretty easy and reasonable (~$300):
https://tinyapps.org/blog/201811300700_windows_10_ltsc.html
People are willing to run highly privileged untrusted and unverified code in the personal computers, just for a chance to remove the stuff you're actively spending money and time developing.
It should be technically easy for Microsoft to decouple Recall from Explorer. I already saw this in the 90s with their web browser, coupled to the OS for purely commercial reasons.
those dubious scripts from who-knows-where are run by me, with intent and with my consent, having passed whatever my own personal review process might be for that particular script.
If I try something and it turns out bad, that's on me, and I'm okay with that. If something is done to me without my knowledge or consent and it turns out bad, then that's a different story.
I'd trust some rando on github more than modern Microsoft
Remember when the retort from Windows users against Linux was "Linux is only free if your time has no value?"
Being a dependency of explorer.exe implies that it can't be disabled. To explain further: explorer.exe is responsible for your task bar, start menu, etc.
The thread describes a much more minimal kind of dependency. More like the dark pattern variety which is hard to turn off.
Be sure to backup your system first. Blackbird thoroughly rips away whatever you choose.
https://privacy.sexy/
It generates the script for you based on your requirements. Looks extremely detailed with long descriptions.
KDE and Kubuntu are pretty close though. I'd never really considered fully switching to Linux a usable option before I found it, but I've been running it for a few years on my laptop and recently on my work pc, and once Win10 is EoL it'll probably be the only thing I still run on the rest of my machines. The nice side effect of bloated Electron apps is that at least now most things work on all platforms lmao.
I recommend ALL these sites, and would only add Black Viper:
https://www.tenforums.com/performance-maintenance/18394-blac...
and...
Windows 10 Integral Edition:
Zone 94 and the Internet archive are temporarily offline,
Hopefully MassGrave.dev is still working.
Deleted Comment
Incredible feeling of zen being able to scroll past the heated online Win 11 debates that don’t seem to apply to my day to day usage at all.
https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/client-management/...
Whatever you do, the GPO / Registry key doesn't work on Non-Education / SE systems.
If you apply it on an Education version, the StartMenuShellExperienceHost (you may need to shuffle those words around) will read the settings. Nothing on my Workstation version.
Now, it MIGHT work if you push it through MDM, but MDMs cost money, and I haven't been able to find a self-hostable MDM that is up to date.
Under Settings > Personalization > Start, I have "More pins" selected, and the various "Show whatever" options disabled, and my "Recommended" section is a single empty row at the bottom of the start menu that reads "To show your recent files and new apps, turn them on in the Settings."
Additionally for O&O shut up fans, it has the option to launch that too within the script's GUI, as neither has to be installed to run
There's a lot of 'marketing' possible and a receptive audience whenever a big tech company pushes something like Copilot/Recall, and I'm sure a well timed or prompt 'quick and simple fix' tool release with some a time pressure could get a lot of installs.
I run this on any new Win install. I also suggest Portmaster so you know where your data is going.
https://safing.io/
Security through obscurity.
The security, though, is for Windows features not user’s protection.
Dead Comment
Windows 7 was the last good OS from MSFT but even that had a bit of telemetry.
Sadly I never had the chance to experience it and went with Windows ME. :(
Sadly even macOS has gotten more annoying over the years with its various nagging prompts.
this whole deal with recall slowly creeping in after the initial rejection is the worst case of just-the-tip I've seen people accept.
will anyone be surprised when it gets enabled in an update by mistake, not to mention by spyware.
> the latest commit to the draft PR now does the following. It leaves Recall enabled, but then it disables it on the first run. During my testing, it kept the explorer look intact
https://distrosea.com/
What about any company with Trade Secret information? Are they also not to use Microsoft Products now?
"Oh no it knows a program was run" is not 'as bad' of a HIIPA violation as, "Oh no, it's literally taking a screenshot, reading it and saving it".