The introduction of a Microsoft developed anti-virus is a large reason why malware and adware prevalence has gone down so sharply in the last decade.

I worked in the break/fix computer industry for almost a decade, and virus cleanups are almost non-existent anymore.

You can meme all you want, but the forced inclusion of anti-virus software has had a measurably positive impact on the average user’s computer security.

It is bad advice to suggest that people turn off updates. Full stop.

Folks got no tolerance for anyone not doing anything the way they decided was most correct back when they were in their twenties.

I don’t like throwing shade online, but at this point, either this is deliberate or you really can’t grasp the nuance of my position.

You do you.

But you shouldn’t recommend that other people do the same things as you if you’re engaging in unsafe behavior.

The top level comment that spawned this was recommending that people use Group Policy and modify their registry values to fully disable automatic updates:

Just go through regedit and group policy settings for anything that feels like it’s going to update windows and disable it.

This whole time, in basically every post, I’ve had to repeatedly say that I am, by no means at all, defending Microsoft. I am condemning bad advice.

At this point, you can have the last word, I think my posts stand for themselves.

Like it or not, Microsoft can do what they want with their operating system.

If you want that to not be the case, swap to Linux.

I’m not trying to defend Microsoft, I’m calling a spade a spade.

This is no different than back when Windows XP was pushed to End of Life, except maybe they’re more nagging about trying to get you on a secure platform vs letting you continue to use an unsecured one. Microsoft will not support every Windows version forever, there will always come a time where the ‘good’ Windows version is no longer supported.

Running an internet-connected computer and turning off updates is bad advice. Doesn’t matter if it’s desktop, laptop, server, cellphone, etc. You should install updates.

Deferring updates until you can make sure there will be no adverse consequences is good advice, but that isn’t what people are recommending here.

Look, dude,

You wanna live-on-the-edge and be reckless? You go ahead. I’m not trying to convince you to stop doing whatever you want with your stuff. We all have that “I know better than everyone else” phase. I had mine, too. Hopefully, when your wax wings melt, your fall won’t be ruinous either.

But you absolutely should stop recommending that other people turn off updates. That is objectively bad advice.

Imagine that happening on somebody’s lab equipment or surgical monitor.

There’s a reason why WSUS is a thing.

Maybe a hospital can take on the court case but I’ve been voiding my warranties since I graduated, that’s just not an option for me.

I’m not implying that end users should sue Microsoft, but Microsoft is an entity that is bound by US law, however flimsy that is nowadays.

The black hat hackers and script kiddies who will infect your machine if you don’t install updates aren’t. Microsoft won’t store CSAM on your computer, or add devices on your network to their DDOS botnet.

It does not matter how bad Microsoft is, turning off updates will always be the worse choice, and recommending that people do so is bad advice. Full stop.

I’ll be the first one to say that I’ve left Windows in the dust for Linux almost 10 years ago. After losing 24-48 hours worth of work **twice** due to automatic updates (on a Windows 7 machine, running data recovery against a deleted partition on an external hard drive. When they took away the ability to have windows download updates but let me choose when to reboot), I swapped to Linux fulltime and have never looked back.

While Microsoft isn’t exactly setting records for user privacy, the answer to “Microsoft is installing things that track what I do for corporate interests” will never be “stop installing updates”. Microsoft is at least an entity you can hold legally responsible for damaging you. Refusing to install updates will only make that problem worse, not better.

I get that the Microsoft Hate bandwagon is a fun ride, but suggesting that users disable updates is bad advice, full stop.

You really should be doing regular updates.

Disabling updates is dangerous and not recommended for a reason.

What a weird way to spell nano

And don’t forget it’s hard-coded to inject affiliate links on certain sites.

Oh, wait, I forgot they said that was an “accident”.

I feel like this is missing a big point of the article.

The vulnerability that the xz backdoor attempt revealed was the developers. The elephant in the room is that for someone capable of writing and maintaining a program so important to modern technical infrastructure, we’re making sure to hang them out to dry. When they burn out because their ‘hobby’ becomes too emotionally draining (either because of a campaign to wear them down intentionally or fully naturally) someone will be waiting to take control. Who can you trust? Here, we see someone attempted (and nearly succeeded) a multi-year effort to establish themselves as a trusted member of the development community who was faking it all along. With the advent of LLMs, it’s going to be even harder to tell if someone is trustworthy, or just a long-running LLM deception campaign.

Maybe, we should treat the people we rely on for these tools a little better for how much they contribute to modern tech infrastructure?

And I’ll point out that’s less aimed at the individuals who use tech, and more at the multi-billion-dollar multi-national tech companies that make money hand over fist using the work others donate.

Firewall redirect and masquerade.

Bitch you thought

It’s the constant war on end users that chased me away from windows.

You can’t say no to their relentless advertising. It’s “maybe later”. The pushing to require a Microsoft account. Ads in the start menu. Windows Recall.

The list goes on. You get as much agency as Microsoft allows, or you violate your eula and modify the os to remove things you don’t want.

We didn’t know it at the time, but windows 7 was peak windows.

It’s not weed, it’s that mint is very aggressive in spreading.

I personally like the mint growing in the yard it makes mowing the lawn smell great.

It’s basically just an end you attach to the fiber:

https://www.gomultilink.com/products/066-222-10?category=44

You’ll use a cleaver to break the fiber at a 90 degree angle to reduce attenuation, and slide it into the connector. Once it bottoms out, you press something down and it grabs the fiber, holding it in place.

I know it’s Youtube, but here’s a video of the process:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WuKm7t87SJU

The idea is you would pull a fiber cable through a building and terminate it with ends like these. Then install them into a bulkhead to make them similar to solid-core CAT5/5e/6 cable into a patch panel. You can then use premade jumpers to connect from the building wiring to the devices you’re using.

The fusion machines are generally used for long distance links because of the significantly lower attenuation per splice. A fiber line that goes 40 miles is likely to have tens if not hundreds of splices in it depending on the number of spans of cable, and industry standard for fusion splices is 0.00-0.05 db attenuation per fusion splice.

You don’t need to fuse every fiber connection unless you’re doing really long distance fiber.

For runs inside a building, single pulls with mechanical splices would work just fine. You shouldn’t get much loss as long as there aren’t more than two or so mechanical splices.

Source: worked as a technician for a fiber optic ISP.

They’re both about the same in terms of privacy so that’s quite an irrelevant thing to bring up. Windows sucks infinitely more from an usability perspective, though.

As someone who has used Linux as their primary desktop OS for about 7 years now, you don’t have to tell me that Windows sucks.

Edit: Oh, one more thing, you don’t have to do some bs hacks to use macOS without an Apple account.

I don’t use any accounts for my OS at all.

Apple making a proprietary pinout for NVME is what will keep me from ever giving them money.

https://assistenciaapplebrasilia.com.br/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/Apple-Propietary-SSD.png

It’s not like Apple uses a different controller, or that they invented a different communication standard. They just put the same communication pins from the same controller on a different physical connector, and charge you 10x for the replacement part. It’s why boards like this can work at all:

https://bartechtv.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/nvme2016macbookPRO-1-678x381.jpg

If Apple wasn’t using standard NVMe controller communication protocols and controllers, these adapter boards wouldn’t work at all.

The only thing that makes Apple marginally better is that the company spying on you tries to pretend like they’re not in it for your sweet data.

They might not be selling it right now, but only because they keep making money hand over fist from the non-repairable proprietary bullshit they produce. Once that faucet starts to slow down, you better believe they’ll be the next Google.