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Windows 10 User? What Data is Being Sent to Microsoft?

May 3, 2018

It's no secret that computer systems send data "under the covers" without the user's knowledge. Apple does it. Google does it. Facebook does it. Windows does it. It's a sad state of affairs that a lot of today's computer users don't care about privacy or what data is being shared with others. Shocker that Facebook users got all cranked up about the amount of data Cambridge Analytics was collecting, but those same users probably haven't read the Terms of Service they agreed to. Microsoft has been criticized for the amount and type of user data that is being transmitted. For most users, the actual detailed description of the "shared" data is unknown.

Microsoft is trying to fix that. It is trying to make the data transmitted in Windows 10 telemetry more transparent. According to a How-To Geek post, you can now view the exact diagnostic information that Windows 10 is sending to Microsoft. The irony is that you have to enable the Diagnostic Data Viewer, which is off by default and can take up to 1GB of hard drive space. The detailed instructions are listed in the post. Once you enable the tracking, you can have vision into the data being sent to Microsoft. You'll even be able to delete the diagnostic data from Microsoft servers.

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