How to Stop Windows 7 or 8 from Downloading Windows 10 Automatically

[Batu69]

Microsoft hasn’t exactly been endearing themselves to tech geeks everywhere lately, with all the privacy concerns and other issues. And now they are automatically downloading all of Windows 10 to your Windows 7 or 8 PC, whether you asked for it or not.

To be clear, they aren’t automatically installing Windows 10, but they are downloading the entire installer, which is at least 3 GB, which takes up a lot of drive space, and also wastes your network bandwidth. For people that don’t have unlimited bandwidth, this can seriously cost you a lot of money.

According to a statement provided to The Register by Microsoft, their explanation is that they think this is a better experience:

“For those who have chosen to receive automatic updates through Windows Update, we help customers prepare their devices for Windows 10 by downloading the files necessary for future installation. This results in a better upgrade experience and ensures the customer’s device has the latest software.”

So this only affects people that have automatic updates enabled, but that’s almost everybody since automatic updates are on by default and are rather important for security reasons — the flood of critical security patches in the last year has shown that it’s probably a good idea to leave automatic updates enabled.

Based on the comments in other news reports about this, a lot of fanboys are going to come along claiming that this isn’t a big deal, it’s just business as usual.

But downloading an entire operating system “just in case” you might want to upgrade to it instead of simply waiting for people to decide to opt in — that isn’t the type of behavior that we want.

This is a really stupid move by Microsoft, and it won’t be surprising if they reverse their decision and stop doing it.

How to Block Windows 10 from Downloading (Hopefully)

[straycat19]

If you didn't turn off updates in July what difference does it make since the same telemetry is being added to 7/8.1. Want to stop Win 10 and similar things in previous versions then uninstall all the updates after June and turn updates off. Voila! No Windows 10 downloads and no telemetry updates.

[steven36]

If you didn't turn off updates in July what difference does it make since the same telemetry is being added to 7/8.1. Want to stop Win 10 and similar things in previous versions then uninstall all the updates after June and turn updates off. Voila! No Windows 10 downloads and no telemetry updates.

You're telling people they never should install no more updates witch is a big security risk.. They may as well install Xp instead :lol: . You put you're piracy before security . You must really have something to hide .? :naughty: If it were me i would give not a :shit: i would just run windows privacy tweaker and anything M$ called out block with W10FC as far as telemetry. I'm not that paranoid . :tehe:

[straycat19]

You're telling people they never should install no more updates witch is a big security risk.. They may as well install Xp instead :lol: . You put you're piracy before security . You must really have something to hide .? :naughty: If it were me i would give not a :shit: i would just run windows privacy tweaker and anything M$ called out block with W10FC as far as telemetry. I'm not that paranoid .

Yep and I am not the least bit worried about piracy or hackers getting into my system, it will never happen. I have lots of things to hide, bank accounts, credit cards, site login/password information, documents from previous jobs, email communications, forensic reports, 100TB NAS, etc. I have more malware stored on my NAS than most people have heard of, somewhere around 1.2 TB at last count. Paranoid, no, just like my privacy and believe that no one gets access to my system or pieces of it without my explicit permission and I am not going to waste time testing and sorting updates. What is the difference between what Microsoft is doing and what hackers/malware writers do? NOTHING.

[OrbingStorm]

I completely agree with straycat19.Microsoft has completely lost my trust.That may change in the future but for now they are not getting an A for attitude.