Microsoft is being sued by three people who claim a Windows 10 update destroyed their data. The company "failed to exercise reasonable care in designing, formulating, and manufacturing the Windows 10 upgrade and placing it into the stream of commerce," the complaint filed in Chicago’s District Court alleges.
The complainants argue the software is defective and that any potential risks about installing it were not made clear by the manufacturer. "As a result of its failure to exercise reasonable care, [the company] distributed an operating system that was liable to cause loss of data or damage to hardware,” the complaint reads.
Read moreOne of the least popular new “features” in Windows 10 is the advertising function Microsoft injected directly into the operating system. Ads show up in a number of ways, from promotions of Windows Store apps in the Start menu to pop-up “reminders” that Microsoft’s Edge browser gets better battery life than Google’s Chrome.
While Microsoft is addressing some other complaints about Windows 10 in the upcoming Creators Update — such as privacy concerns over the data that’s being transmitted and issues regarding how the operating system updates itself — the company seems intent on retaining Windows 10’s advertising functionality.
Read moreAn update to Windows software has caused problems for personal computer users trying to connect to the internet. Several European internet service providers (ISPs) have highlighted the problem, which can strike regardless of the type of router box or the particular ISP in use.
Microsoft has offered guidance to those experiencing difficulties. Computers running Microsoft's latest updates are losing network connectivity essentially because the PCs cannot automatically pick up the addressing systems from their broadband routers, which then cannot connect them to the internet. This is not the first time a Windows 10 update has created trouble.
Read moreMicrosoft has reportedly signed a deal with FireEye that will see it share telemetry data from Windows 10 with the third-party security outfit. Microsoft and FireEye's partnership will also see FireEye "gain access to telemetry from every device running Windows 10."
Microsoft uses telemetry data from Windows 10 to help identify security issues, to fix problems and to help improve the quality of its operating system, which sounds like a good thing. However, with the company previously admitting that it's latest OS is harvesting more data than any version before it, Microsoft's mega data-slurp also raised some privacy concerns.
Read moreThe actor behind the Kovter Trojan has come up with a new persistence mechanism over the past weeks and also started masquerading the malware as a Chrome update, Microsoft security researchers warn.
It’s a well-known fact that cybercriminals are constantly updating their malicious applications to ensure increased efficiency, and the people behind Kovter have been very active in this regard over the past several months: in April, they added ransomware capabilities to this file-less Trojan, while starting to masquerade it as a Firefox update several weeks ago. Now, Microsoft Malware Protection Center researchers reveal that the actor has updated Kovter’s persistence method.
Read moreThe French data protection authority ordered Microsoft Corp to stop collecting excessive data on users of its Windows 10 operating system and serving them personalized ads without their consent.
The CNIL said the U.S. company had three months to stop tracking browsing by users so that Windows apps and third-party apps can offer them targeted advertising without their consent, failing which it could initiate a sanctions procedure. A number of EU data protection authorities created a contact group to investigate Microsoft's Windows 10 operating system following its launch in July 2015, the French privacy watchdog said.
Read moreFor more than two decades, Microsoft Windows has provided the means for clever attackers to surreptitiously install malware of their choice on computers that connect to booby-trapped printers, or other devices.
The vulnerability resides in the Windows Print Spooler, which manages the process of connecting to available printers and printing documents. A protocol known as Point-and-Print allows people who are connecting to a network-hosted printer for the first time to automatically download the necessary driver immediately before using it. It works by storing a shared driver on the printer or print server and eliminates the hassle of the user having to manually download and install it.
Read moreMicrosoft is today closing off a vulnerability that one Chinese researcher claims has “probably the widest impact in the history of Windows.” Every version of the Microsoft operating system going back to Windows 95 is affected, leaving anyone still running unsupported operating systems, such as XP, in danger of being surreptitiously surveilled.
The bug can be exploited silently with a “near-perfect success rate”, as the problems lie in the design of Windows. The ultimate impact? An attacker can hijack all a target’s web use, granting the hacker ”Big Brother power”, as soon as the victim opens a link or plugs in a USB stick.
Read moreSecurity researchers have discovered a new kink in the tactics of malware operators, who are now combining spam campaigns, malicious Word documents, and PowerShell code to deliver fileless malware to their targets.
None of these techniques is new, but they have never been used together until now, showing that malware operators are also paying closer attention to security research and the work of some of their peers, borrowing techniques from each other in their ever-present struggle to evade detection. Security researchers have discovered this campaign, and they're saying that it's relatively small at the moment.
Read moreMyth: By disabling all privacy compromising and telemetry features on Windows 10 will stop Microsoft to track your activities. Fact: Even after all telemetry features disabled, Windows 10 is phoning home more than you could ever think of.
Ever since the launch of Microsoft's newest operating system, Windows 10 is believed to be spying on its users. I wrote a number of articles to raise concern about Windows 10 privacy issues. The only solution believed to cope up with these issues is to disable all the telemetry features or use an automated tool to disable all privacy-infringing features in just one click.
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