Microsoft is Using Malware-like Pop-Ups in Windows 11 To Get People To Ditch Google (theverge.com) 106
An anonymous reader writes: I thought I had malware on my main Windows 11 machine this weekend. There I was minding my own business in Chrome before tabbing back to a game and wham a pop-up appeared asking me to switch my default search engine to Microsoft Bing in Chrome. Stunningly, Microsoft now thinks it's ok to shove a pop-up in my face above my apps and games just because I dare to use Chrome instead of Microsoft Edge. This isn't a normal notification, either. It didn't appear in the notification center in Windows 11, nor is it connected to the part of Windows 11 that suggests new features to you. It's quite literally a rogue executable file that has somehow appeared in c:\windows\temp\mubstemp and is digitally signed by Microsoft.
"We are aware of these reports and have paused this notification while we investigate and take appropriate action to address this unintended behavior," says Caitlin Roulston, director of communications, in a statement to The Verge. [...] This isn't Microsoft's first rodeo, either. I'm growing increasingly frustrated by the company's methods of getting people to switch from Google and Chrome to Bing and Edge. Microsoft has been using a variety of prompts for years now, with pop-ups appearing inside Chrome, on the Windows taskbar, and elsewhere. Microsoft has even forced people into Edge after a Windows Update, and regularly presents a full-screen message to switch to Bing and Edge after updates.
"We are aware of these reports and have paused this notification while we investigate and take appropriate action to address this unintended behavior," says Caitlin Roulston, director of communications, in a statement to The Verge. [...] This isn't Microsoft's first rodeo, either. I'm growing increasingly frustrated by the company's methods of getting people to switch from Google and Chrome to Bing and Edge. Microsoft has been using a variety of prompts for years now, with pop-ups appearing inside Chrome, on the Windows taskbar, and elsewhere. Microsoft has even forced people into Edge after a Windows Update, and regularly presents a full-screen message to switch to Bing and Edge after updates.
Well, from their perspective... (Score:5, Funny)
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Perspective?
Does the seasoned Microsoft lawyer really need to walk down the hall to the executive wing and remind them personally by whispering "antitrust" in their ear?
You know, 'cause from our "perspective"...
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It's only antitrust illegal if you don't give 10% to the big guy.
Thanks for the laugh. Seriously.
Too Big To Fail tends to hint you're not far off.
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The worst is everything else.
Re:Well, from their perspective... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: Well, from their perspective... (Score:2)
Seconded. Linux OSes haven't been perfect for me, but they've been better to me than every other option I've tried.
(Admittedly, I didn't try Slackware very long.)
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Re:is this legal? (Score:5, Informative)
Legal is whatever you can get the government to not prosecute you for.
It was not legal in 2000 when Clinton was president. It became legal in 2001 when Dubya became president and has been legal ever since.
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The EU have their own rules, although they take years to formulate them - by which time they are often obsolete.
Not just 11 (Score:3)
I use 10 with Opera as my browser. Noticed pop-ups twice in the last two days suggesting/recommending 1.Edge & 2.Bing.
No idea how, thought I'd disabled everything I didn't want.
Bah!
Re:Not just 11 (Score:5, Funny)
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I bought Windows PRO for my home workstation specifically so I could shut off all the bullshit. Without fail, about once a month, it'll reset all the things I shut off to the default state without warning. I'll have a "oh crap, gotta go" moment, go to shutdown, and every option is something about running windows update as it shuts down, despite having turned off all the auto-update garbage. There's no escape. You will be assimilated.
It makes me wish I didn't have these last two software packages I can't get
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That's disappointing. I was considering paying more for pro to avoid this BS, but if paying extra doesn't even work...
Windows Pro is fine. Its the only one worth using. Windows Pro for Workstations is even better. Its a bit more expensive but worth it.
.... that's Windows for Stupid People.
((OH NO!! HE ACTUALLY PAID FOR SOFTWARE!! OUTRAGEOUS!!))
With Pro and Pro for Workstations you still have to do some tweaking, but you CAN turn off all the useless garbage. Never use the Home version of Windows
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That's disappointing. I was considering paying more for pro to avoid this BS, but if paying extra doesn't even work...
Windows Pro is fine. Its the only one worth using. Windows Pro for Workstations is even better. Its a bit more expensive but worth it. ((OH NO!! HE ACTUALLY PAID FOR SOFTWARE!! OUTRAGEOUS!!)) With Pro and Pro for Workstations you still have to do some tweaking, but you CAN turn off all the useless garbage. Never use the Home version of Windows .... that's Windows for Stupid People.
Yes, PRO gives you the option to turn off most of the annoying shit. It just turns it all back on at random. I have yet to find a way to remove the constant ad-like notices in a permanent way. It'll be removed for about two to three weeks, then just randomly start happening again. Oh, and if you do update Windows, expect EVERY setting you've ever changed to revert to defaults. It's Microsoft's system. We're just given the honor of trying to keep it's mess cleaned up.
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There is a good version (Score:4, Informative)
Once again, a large company has produced such a crap product for legitimate users that those who have already paid should still pirate it anyway. If you are an individual with a personal computer, you really do have nothing to use by doing so.
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I paid for Windows 7 Pro, that made good sense at the time.
I'm not paying for Windows now, though. It has fucking ads in it. I can turn them off, you say? Well fuck me running, that's how I wanted to spend my time.
Microsoft has been a running joke all along, but they've really gone around the bend now.
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I bought Windows PRO for my home workstation specifically so I could shut off all the bullshit. Without fail, about once a month, it'll reset all the things I shut off to the default state without warning. I'll have a "oh crap, gotta go" moment, go to shutdown, and every option is something about running windows update as it shuts down, despite having turned off all the auto-update garbage. There's no escape. You will be assimilated.
Microsoft is obnoxiously aggressive with updates. There is a sort of a watchdog service WaaSMedic that automatically undoes most attempts to disable windows updates. Destroying the service prevents it from performing all of its associated bullshit:
del c:\windows\system32\WaaSM*
For some it might be easier to boot into PE or something because you have to have good timing to pull off the deletion.
Otherwise as I've mentioned in the past the easiest and most effective method to stop all of the nonsense in a si
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I bought Windows PRO for my home workstation specifically so I could shut off all the bullshit. Without fail, about once a month, it'll reset all the things I shut off to the default state without warning. I'll have a "oh crap, gotta go" moment, go to shutdown, and every option is something about running windows update as it shuts down, despite having turned off all the auto-update garbage. There's no escape. You will be assimilated.
Microsoft is obnoxiously aggressive with updates. There is a sort of a watchdog service WaaSMedic that automatically undoes most attempts to disable windows updates. Destroying the service prevents it from performing all of its associated bullshit:
del c:\windows\system32\WaaSM*
For some it might be easier to boot into PE or something because you have to have good timing to pull off the deletion.
Otherwise as I've mentioned in the past the easiest and most effective method to stop all of the nonsense in a single operation is to use advanced firewall inside of the group policy editor. Disable rule merging (prevents normal firewall rules outside of the policy editor from being applied), block outbound connections by default and whitelist the software you want to access the Internet. This puts an end to data exfiltration, auto updating...etc.
As a dude who's been in IT related roles for over thirty years, this seems reasonable. To the average user? It shouldn't have to be that much work just to have a usable system that isn't trying to rape you blind.
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Bing
Is
Not
Google
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That's a bit of a non-sequitur, who said Bing was Google?
I certainly didn't.
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WHOOOOSH
Read It Down The Left Edge
Google issues bogus warnings too (Score:2)
Re: Google issues bogus warnings too (Score:2)
Can you elaborate? I use K9-Mail and Kmail and never have any notification from Google about malware in my systems.
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Windows is Malware (Score:3)
Just goes to show that you can't tell the difference between Windows and malware.
I am continually amazed that people keep using Windows out of pure stupidity, laziness or corporate edict.
It's really not hard to change to a more secure OS... just about any other OS would be better.
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Only vaguely reasonable reason to use Windows at this point is for either games or corporate AD/Azure requirements - the former is increasingly viable from a Mac or Linux (eg. with nVidia's remote gaming service, if nothing else) and the latter is becoming less tenable by the day for anything but really large organizations.
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Only vaguely reasonable reason to use Windows at this point is for either games or corporate AD/Azure requirements - the former is increasingly viable from a Mac or Linux (eg. with nVidia's remote gaming service, if nothing else) and the latter is becoming less tenable by the day for anything but really large organizations.
AD can easily be replaced by Zentyal, administered by Linux machines and ignored by C-Levels.
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I have some "processes" which only have Windows - or maybe MacOs - interfaces. This means I have to fire my old dual-boot Laptop under Windows every couple of months, of course it then spends hours applying patches (stuff which takes minutes under Linux) but that's the way things work.
The point is that I have this old Windows licence and if I need it, I use it.
One of them is reading some PDFs I get which require a full-featured Acrobat Reader, annoying as f*** but I'm yet to find a reader-clone which cover
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You can buy Apple MacOS computers and Chromebooks in "main street shops". Apple more expensive than Windows computers and Chromebooks are less expensive so you do have a choice.
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You can buy Apple MacOS computers and Chromebooks in "main street shops". Apple more expensive than Windows computers and Chromebooks are less expensive so you do have a choice.
Apple is significantly more expensive, without being any better or more secure. Chromebooks may be more secure, but only because they are useless.
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Apple is significantly more expensive, without being any better or more secure.
As someone who has worked with both, my experience is that Macs last longer. I am lucky to get 4 years out of a PC laptop. My Mac laptops hardware generally last way past the OS support.
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This is how Apple did it in the early 2000s with MacOS X and saved the Mac from irrelevance.
it may have saved the mac from extinction, but considering that the mac has since barely scratched a market share of 10% in its best year (it is now around 7%), i don't think that strategy worked particularly well to escape irrelevance. apple gets disproportionate notoriety and noise for the actual presence.
then again i don't think there was an actual strategy to promote ios. macs were shipped with ios because it's the only thing they ran unless you hacked them hard. one of apple's strong points was actuall
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macs were shipped with ios because it's the only thing they ran unless you hacked them hard
And when was this?
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Re:Windows is Malware (Score:4, Insightful)
high purchasing power such as
yes, i did mention it is a status symbol.
Desktop Linux should learn from Apple's approach:
nothing. there is no company named "Desktop Linux" pushing any product to take over any market. it's a toolbox, it's free, it's open, it's transparent, it's fully based on choice and full user's control. if any of that is of some importance then "desktop linux" simply can't be beaten, it has no competition whatsoever, period.
that's just a gift to humanity. other than that it can also be used in/as/for business, naturally. there have been indeed discrete attempts to make a popular mass product out of it, some of them even to a degree of success. and it does take inspiration from private companies and general innovation. for better or for worse, this has led to real embarrassments like canonical's "unity" desperately trying to look cooler and attractive by literally copying aspects of apple's desktop. just like kde meticulously copied and then overengineered every single windows(tm) window manager feature in the early days, just to prove they could. but this is just a result of choice and diversity being fundamental tenets in open source software. which means that even with specific fuck-ups, corporate or not, there tend to be alternatives for everything, and it's a dynamic and resilient system where these aberrations die out naturally or at least can be easily avoided, much like a self-healing ecosystem. much unlike any product from a corporation. it's simply not comparable.
then again the feature list might not fully overlap the latest shiny thing from corporations. horses for courses. a good example is the windows pc in regards to gaming. by means of the strategy you explained, wildly circulating its os and getting every kind of hardware producer involved to bundle it or provide drivers, it has become the only real platform where you can do serious gaming, even more so if custom peripherals are involved. and that's why i chose to spend a lot of money in a windows box, even if i don't give a shit about windows. and there is nothing specific that a mac (or windows for that matter) could offer me that i don't have already covered by a ... linux laptop, tailored to my tastes and peeves.
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this has led to real embarrassments like canonical's "unity" desperately trying to look cooler and attractive by literally copying aspects of apple's desktop.
Not really a bad plan. Compiz, emerald, avant-window-navigator, GNOME 2, and the right GTK+ and Qt themes gave a prettier-than-OSX system with diehard capabilities. I think you can actually run all of those things again now (some were not available for a while) but I wouldn't wager on their stability at this point. But today you'd also have much more credible versions of Wine to help fill in compatibility.
The problem is, canonical tried to invent something based on something crap instead of just adopting an
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Riiight, an OS with 30% market share in the most important markets is a "status symbol"... keep coping. The fact computer-knowledgeable people are willing to pay extra for MacOS should clue you on how wrong your approach is.
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Riiight, an OS with 30% market share in the most important markets is a "status symbol".
sigh ... yes, exactly.
The fact computer-knowledgeable people are willing to pay extra for MacOS should clue you on how wrong your approach is.
dear forum friend, i'm afraid you backed yourself into a nasty corner here. because now i would promptly challenge you to enlighten me as to how and exactly why "computer-knowledgeable people" prefer macs over other pcs (when in fact the opposite is notoriously true, apart from some hipster coder or design worker, since macs are specifically tailored and marketed to computer illiterates. yes, with high income).
although it would be hilarious to watch you struggle producing an elaborate
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Because MacOS is Unix with a UX that doesn't suck and comes in a nicely optimized computer. What if I told you some computer-knowledgeable people actually value a nice UX and a nice optimization and integration and don't want to spend time tinkering with OSes to get stuff to maybe work? Shoc
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That last one -- corporate edict -- is exactly the problem.
I go into the auditorium to teach my 600 student class. There is a computer connected to the projector. I download my slides (in PDF format) onto its desktop and doubleclick to open.
It opens in Edge. Nope -- that won't work.
I right-click it and open in Adobe Acrobat. Our IT folks have removed Acrobat Reader from all the computers. And Adobe Acrobat wants me to log in to my "Adobe Creative Cloud" account. I don't have one of those...
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I used to work for a large multinational organization. Their corporate OS was (of course) Windows. They did give me a Dell laptop for traveling. I installed Linux on it and didn't tell anybody. I used it on my frequent international travels to meetings where people would bring malware from all over the world. (At the time, USB sticks were the primary means of file sharing.) Fortunately, I wasn't tied into any Windows corporate captureware so I could use this without difficulty.
My Linux laptop saved me from
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Yes -- they've replaced it with fuckall.
It turns out we *do* have an enterprise license for CC. But logging in (which of course involves a lot of slow web-things and clicking through license agreements and dismissing popups and other such nonsense) while students are asking me stuff and I'm also trying to set up the room audio and juggle demonstrations is ridiculous.
Tomorrow I am bringing my own laptop and doing "okular lecture2.pdf" and that will be that.
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sorry linux people but there are some hard truths you have to accept
1. people like windows, not just because they are used to it but 99% of the time it works for them. it aint the XP/Vista days anymore, stop treating it like it is. out of the box windows 10/11 is perfectly fine and secure for almost everyone. what isnt secure is the users but that will always be true no matter the OS.
2. stories like this are just nerd bait but wont move the needle. what folks here see as a gross violation the average pe
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" just about any other OS would be better"
Maybe for email, word processing, spreadsheet and web browsing
A LOT of professional level software in engineering, science, medicine, video and audio production, etc is windows only
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Yes. Of course if you're locked into some specialist software that only runs on Windows, then you're SOL.
Re: Windows is Malware (Score:2)
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A LOT of professional level software in engineering, science, medicine, video and audio production, etc is windows only
The last time I checked science uses a lot of Linux and Unix. As for video and audio production, I am pretty sure there is a large number of Mac users.
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To quote an internet meme from before they were called memes:
"A virus actually does something, and generally gets better tech support."
Lobbying (Score:5, Interesting)
They learned after their lawsuit over Explorer in the 90s that they don't need to stop with the malicious behavior, they simply need to play ball and start greasing the right palms.
The things they do today are ten-thousand times more egregious than anything they ever did to Netscape, but they're fully permitted to do so by the system of lawmakers and enforcers that we have.
Ducks (Score:5, Insightful)
Let's see...
* Intrusive and often difficult to get rid of
* Many third party tools available for diagnosis and removal
* Causes unwanted resource use
* Usually directly responsible for inexplicable instability
* Usually installs software from unscrupulous websites
* Sends data to third parties without your permission
* Often takes the form of ransomware
* Increasingly sophisticated in its methods of intrusion
* Surprisingly works as intended by the developers despite being exceedingly poorly developed
* Many hard to track variants in the wild with extremely varied behavior
* Makes unsolicited changes to your software and data
If it walks like a duck and floats like a duck...
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Wait, are you talking about Windows, or Chrome?
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... you're kidding, right? None of these things apply to Chrome. Not even the resource use - I've got hundreds of tabs open and it's only using 3GB of memory - and most of that is for video rendering.
Even if you must run Windows only software (Score:1)
Even if you *must* run Windows only software, at least switch to another host OS, run Windows in a VM, use it only for the software which is Windows only, and lock down the VM's access as much as those applications allow.
If you're forced to run Windows only software which truly only works on bare metal, may $deity have mercy on your wretched soul.
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The professional use of this machine is as a Digital Audio Workstation, and there are many, many instruments that are not available outside the Windows/Mac duopoly thanks to Native Instruments not supporting anything else. Due to latency, this has to run on bare metal too. It has to claim the entire audio system for itself and know that it is the only thing allowed to write to or read from the audio device.
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If you're forced to run Windows only software which truly only works on bare metal, may $deity have mercy on your wretched soul.
ExamSoft (yeah, it's college exam software) requires bare metal. I tried to run it in a VM but it wouldn't. I wound up buying a $200 Best Buy special specifically for that. After I graduated, I wiped the machine, clean-imaged it, and gave it away.
Browsers should be publicly owned (Score:3)
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Microsoft learned those lessons very well: it's fine to do shady things if you bribe the right people.
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You mean, like the Mozilla Foundation? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
There's nothing stopping this now. And if you've ever used FireFox, you know that it too engages in advertising and marketing and business deals.
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It's nothing new (Score:2)
As of Win 11 Ditching Windows - Sure I'm Not Alone (Score:3)
Microsoft has seen fit to inject advertising in places in Windows 11, like the task bar etc. This already has prompted me to start ditching the MS OS unless needed for work machines, and even then I think if and when I am forced to replace Windows 10, I will very grudgingly switch to Apple (an ecosystem I hate, but I hate corporate adware and malware even more as it usually goes hand in hand with data mining, my data). But for my home entertainment machine that I had to replace this month for streaming movies and other entertainment, I've just built a new Linux box. When I asked about OEM Win 10 at the computer supply store, they said nope, no longer available. Bye bye MS.
Everyone is using these kind of pop ups (Score:2)
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MS, driving even the non techs away. (Score:1)
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malware - yes (Score:2, Insightful)
I thought I had malware on my main Windows 11 machine this weekend.
You do. It's called "Windows 11". The crime gang running it is in the US, but the FBI and Justice Department so far have been unable to penetrate their careful corporate shield. They're a clever gang as well, because they demand ransom in small, recurring demands in US$, which makes the outfit seem legitimate to unsuspecting users, unlike the less sophisticated "pay us a lot of money in shady crypto coins" ransomware gangs.
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Backdoor (Score:2)
If Microsoft can do this, hackers will figure out how to exploit it.
Not a matter of if, but when. M$ has never learned this lesson
A reply to this topic...slash is...meh. (Score:1)
A Boot Sector Virus (Score:2)
Over the decades people have said that DOS and later Windows were "boot sector viruses." Perhaps they were right all along given Windows 11's current behavior!
I once thoroughly enjoyed using Windows when I was using Windows 2000 and XP, and I must admit a certain fondness for Windows 95. Yes, as an operating system, especially compared to Windows NT, it was a piece of shit under the hood, but it was perhaps the greatest software engineering hack in history, something that "just worked" on a very wide rang
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My company runs a large number of regressions on Windows (and a lot more on Linux, because: performance).
Just today, the tests we run on one VM failed because there is a large popup that is on top of the AUT and interferes with screenshot matching.
Also, today, tests on a Windows Server instance failed to run because the machine (which does almost nothing) is out of memory.
And it's getting worse. Throughput and reliability on Windows 7 VMs is much better than Windows 10 (yes, we still have customers on Wind
Ugh (Score:2)
I've given MS the benefit of the doubt in the past and I even feel the XP EU court case was not necessary. You obviously need a web browser to download another web browser, and most people don't care which web browser they use, so it's perfectly reasonable to bundle Internet Explorer. Similar logic can apply to things like antivirus or a media player. But, Microsoft is definitely going too far with things like this. Let me choose my defaults and respect those choices once I've made them. I feel like an anti
Google should fight back (Score:2)
I've seen similar spam in Windows 10.
Google should fight back, like have a notice-bar pop up when Windows Chrome starts, saying "Chrome is better than Edge and Bing sucks, tell Nadella to shove his spam up his cloud." If MS complains, say "we'll take our spam down if you take yours down".
Actually Google's search site will display a much gentler version of this if you Google in Edge.
I like a good oligopoly knock-down-drag-out fight. Oracle used to have ads showing competitor DB brands as crashing planes. I
the only thing Microsoft managed to do is (Score:2)
Use Windows, get Malware (Score:2)
I will never go back to windows (Score:2)
What do you mean "malware like"? (Score:2)
Win11 is malware.
Quite seriously, have you tried cleaning your computer of it? Call an exorcist.
Sounds illegal (Score:2)
Anti-competitive practices like these are seriously illegal and can result in huge fines and worse.
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"Anti-competitive practices like these are seriously illegal and can result in huge fines and worse".
If we are ever able to get enough control back over our elected representatives to replace "can result" with "will result", these grifters might actually have to worry a little.
A taste of their own medicine.... (Score:1)
So Microsoft is doing what Google has been doing for years when you visit a Google property with a non-Chrome browser?
" ... this unintended behavior ... " (Score:2)
Revenue Vector (Score:1)
"...address this unintended behavior," (Score:1)
Windows 10, too (Score:2)
Same thing. In the middle of some complex programming stuff and BANG.
In your eye, MS!
Wake up and smell the coffee (Score:2)
Windows has been Malware since version 8, duh.
Meaningfulness (Score:2)
>"I'm growing increasingly frustrated by the company's methods of getting people to switch from Google and Chrome to Bing and Edge."
So do something actually meaningful and switch to Firefox and either StartPage or DuckDuckgo. Give the middle finger to both Google and Microsoft.
Or, if you are feeling ambitious, do that while also moving to Linux so you can take full control over your computer.
hardly news (Score:2)
Watch the FTC (Score:2)
Several versions of Microsoft Windows have demanded "Do you want to change this" whenever the Microsoft product is deselected (Adobe Acrobat and Sun Java being exceptions to the rule.) Now, randomly complaining, then demanding the user change software, is power that no other software vendor has. Recently, the US FTC has been slow to criticize Microsoft but even they cannot ignore such abuse of market power. It will be telling, how loud the US DoJ is in their complaint.
How is this differetn? (Score:2)
MS has always shown popups suggesting that you try switching to Edge and Bing. Now the popups are prettier. But they certainly aren't new!
Not a good look. (Score:1)
I guess always buy the Pro version (Score:2)