Is the upcoming Recall AI feature of the Windows 11 operating system a privacy nightmare? While the verdict is still out about that, it is clearly problematic on several levels in its current state.
Recall takes screenshots of the computer screen every 5 seconds. The default configuration takes screenshots of pretty much everything. The only exceptions are private browsing windows of popular browsers and DRM-protected content.
Every other activity, including views of financial documents, porn, games, visited websites, messages, and more may be captured.
It saves the data to a locally stored SQLite database. There it is kept until it is either deleted to make room for newer data or deleted by the user.
Users have several options:
- Disable Recall entirely, which will likely erase the entire database.
- Reduce the assigned storage size, which will delete older entries.
- Use the delete snapshots option to delete some or all snapshots taken.
Multiple parties want access to Recall
Since Recall saves a user’s entire work history on a device for three months by default, it will be seen as a treasure trove by multiple parties.
- Malware actors may find ways to grab the entire database, which is not encrypted when the system is running.
- Law enforcement, customs, spies, state sponsored hackers may also want access to it.
Recall offers interesting data. Screenshots of one-time messages, or messages that get deleted by the user of the PC. These remain in the database until they are flushed out because of age.
Recall is not all that useful for most Windows users
The idea of searching through the computing activity of the past three months may sound appealing to some users.
In work or research environments, it may be seen as a great feature, provided that Microsoft gets privacy, security, regulatory requirements, and all of that in order before release.
For most home users, Recall does not have a great value proposition.
What problem is Recall solving? How often do home users need to find something very specific on their devices that they have trouble finding using the built-in search or manual searching?
In all of Microsoft’s talks and announcements, the company has not really answered that question.
If you weight this now against the prospect of maintaining a database on your computer that reveals what you have done on it in the past three months, then it is likely that most users may pass on this.
Depending on how it launches, enabled by default, with or without notification to the user, it is probably not going to see the wide use that Microsoft hopes it will have.
Closing Words
Recall is not here yet and things may change before the final release later this year. Most home users who happen to purchase Copilot+ PCs may want to consider disabling Recall to block the feature from recording everything they do on their devices.
I suggest you check out the following thread on Recall for additional information on it and the issues that it introduces.
What about you? Would you make use of Recall, if it would be available on your devices?
MS becoming less and less secure, and more and more intrusive into user privacy. This has been happening for years, and I am sure will continue and get worse.
I have been using and telling freinds and family about Linux for a long time. Over the past t few years lots of them have made the switch. No one who switched has even considered switching back to windows.
Linux is becoming more and more user friendly and even some of in the gaming commuity are using it. Maybe its time for some of the major pc makers to start making the alternative OS avilible again as a default installation.
When was the last time Microsoft did something for consumers? Recall is just a tracking and telemetry grab disguised as a feature.
HAHAHA!! I don’t even use Windows any more; forget Recall. Maybe Schwazenegger is interested. 😉
So it’s essentially a keylogger baked into the OS. How this will benefit the users is a mystery.