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Comment by amanzi | Hacker News Reader

I'm all for hating on Microsoft for their continued destruction of the local Windows 11 experience, but I actually think this is a good decision. Assuming you're logging in with a Microsoft account, and assuming you have a OneDrive account, it's a better experience to set up the folder backup feature as early as possible in the set-up process. If you really don't want it, it's easy to undo.

I still don't like being forced to log in with a Microsoft account as part of the set-up. I prefer to log in locally, and then incrementally turn on the cloud features. But I've voted with my wallet and have moved to Linux and macOS for day-to-day desktop computing. I still keep a Windows 10 VM around for when I need it, but am doing all I can to avoid the "modern" Windows desktop experience.

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What happens when your files are considered Bad and Microsoft removes them? When the OneDrive backend suffers bit rot or misconfiguration? What happens when your Microsoft account is compromised? When the photos of your kids in the bath are sent to the police? When you have a 10GB file that's frequently modified and the client then constantly scans it and uploads it? When your abusive partner, relation, co-worker or boss uses this to surveil you, tamper with or remove your files or even plant evidence? When your business or organisation now suffers from liability from not performing due data protection diligence of something they were not informed nor asked consent for? The list of reasons why this is terrible just goes on and on.

Something many have to consider. When doing something positive, think about how it can be abused to the negative.

It doesn't mean, do not do the good thing - it means consider how to prevent the bad thing at the same time.

Any of this would be an implementation level fault, and Dropbox, iCloud, Google Photos and Meta's chat apps have had this solved for decades. I don't see why OneDrive couldn't.

If you hate the design, don't let your arguments rely on a bad implementation of what you hate. Make them work with a perfect one.

iCloud sometimes silently fails to download files. Dropbox have, on multiple occasions, resurrected years-deleted files, Drive is a dumpster fire - it doesn't even support exclusions, so will happily (try to) sync multi-gigabyte PST files, causing drastic CPU, drive and network IO saturation and Outlook faults. But hey, at least people consent to this trouble.

Linux and macOS is a great combo. I recently bought a full-spec UM790 Pro (Ryzen 9 with 64GB RAM), installed Ubuntu and colocated it with my router. I run vscode on my low-spec Mac Mini (M1 with 8GB RAM) with all the grunt work handled by the Ubuntu server thanks to the Remote-SSH extension. I saved several thousands of dollars by not buying a Mac with a decent amount of RAM, get the great macOS user experience, and develop on the platform (Linux) that I’m deploying to.

> full-spec UM790 Pro (Ryzen 9 with 64GB RAM)

Fun fact: The machine actually supports up to 96GB (2x CT48G56C46S5).

What happens when small-firm doctors, therapists, dentists, etc. are suddenly having your (their patients') medical information backed-up to OneDrive? Microsoft only provide HIPAA compliance if a certain paid tier is purchased. If they automatically turn OneDrive on how will this not be a privacy nightmare?

From what I've gleaned from my social worker/therapist house mate is that you're not supposed to be storing any of that data on a non-compliant device to begin with. They can't keep anything local, and use some portal to a company that specializes in HIPAA storage.

I agree in general though, there are plenty of documents that really shouldn't be suddenly dumped to the cloud

The point here is that you might have a system that is compliant, but then MS pushes this and suddenly it’s uploading data that you thought was safe.

Surely this has happened with this latest change? It got turned on for my work machine a few months ago and tried to upload some very large modelling files to the cloud. I have to keep that stuff in the root dir now, but most PC users don't even know what the root dir is.

This is light on details, but according to the article, this only happens during the initial Windows 11 set-up, and not for existing users: "Quietly and without any announcement, the company changed Windows 11's initial setup so that it could turn on the automatic folder backup without asking for it."

> Assuming you're logging in with a Microsoft account

The whole issue lies within this assumption. Microsoft does not want you to use a local account, and they make it extremely difficult to setup your Windows machine without one.

Yep - I agree with that. I set up a Windows 11 machine recently and was still able to create a local account. I'm sure there will be ways to defeat the new requirement. I haven't tried this, but even if they forced a Microsoft account during set up, couldn't you just create a local admin account once logged in, then log in with that account and delete the first profile?

Replying to myself - I just tried this and it works as expected. After initial set-up with a Microsoft account, you can create a local account and log in with that instead (and also delete the first Microsoft account too).

> I actually think this is a good decision

Whatever happened to just, I dunno, asking what to do?

> But I've voted with my wallet and have moved to Linux and macOS for day-to-day desktop computing

As did I about 7 years ago. Still have to use Windows servers at work, but I’m even supplanting many of those with Linux servers as and when I can

Except when it doesn't ask you if you want it to do that, and suddenly after investigating why my games are patching slow as shit it turns out my OneDrive is full from game patches that it synced from my Documents/My Games folder and my network speed is being destroyed by OneDrive syncing the patches up every time the launcher replaces a patch file.

I'm all in for automated backups, but let the user know that their entire user folder is gonna get synced and give an option to disable it (opt-out) on the OOBE. Make this optional and explicit.

I think a company, without my permission, copying my personal files to their server is the definition of not a good decision

Note that this is only during set-up, so at that point you don't have any personal files on the machine. And this is only if you're logging in with a Microsoft account with a valid OneDrive account. The article is light on details, but I assume (hope) there's some UI to explain what's going on.

This isn't only during setup. The article says it turns on backing up of your user folder. Which even if it doesn't have anything on install, will soon

It’s better to make it optional. I may have files I don’t want Microsoft sniffing through. It’s great to have a backup as an option. But to just upload “Documents”by complete surprise is pretty dirty. I’m sure it’s buried 20 pages deep in their EULA somewhere though.

What you refer to as a backup in reality is data exfiltration from users' computers. Terrible idea for a million reasons.

I don't want my files uploaded or scanned by third parties without my permission. Something that's happened here

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