Microsoft Telemetry exists since Windows 7. But the big change came with Windows 10 were the telemetry feature is preinstalled and enabled by default. It also seems that Microsoft increased the amount of data that they collect.
Telemetry tracks and collects the usage patterns and the activity on your computer. This diagnostic data collection is sent directly back to Microsoft servers so that they can help them with advertisements, Windows performance monitoring and troubleshooting and even to filter adult content.
Telemetry obviously benefits Microsoft but on the other hand there are some serious privacy concerns for Windows 10 users. The biggest problem is that only Enterprise customers have the option to turn off diagnostic data flaws and disable telemetry. Only Windows 10 Pro, Enterprise and Education users can turn it off completely via the GUI menu (Group Policy Editor) or by editing the registry. For all the other users (Home edition) it is extremely hard to disable telemetry and all they can do is to adjust and limit the collection of their data.
Limiting Windows 10 telemetry data - For Windows Home users
- Go to the Start menu, right-click and select settings. A new window will pop up
- From there select (left - click) Privacy and after that go to Feedback & diagnostics.
- In the Windows Settings menu, click Privacy > Diagnostics and feedback. Now you have access to telemetry settings.
- Select the first option: Required diagnostic data. This option will also prevent inking and typing data from being sent to Microsoft.
Turning off completely Windows 10 telemetry data collection - For Windows 10 Pro, Enterprise and Education users
There are two options to disable telemetry. The first one is by using the Local Group Policy Editor. The second one is by editing the registry using regedit.
The command gpedit.msc opens the policy editor
Now lets do this using the local group policy editor first:
- Press Windows + R, type gpedit.msc and press OK. The local group policy editor will pop up.
- To the left tab find the Computer Configuration option and select it with a double left mouse click.
- Do the same to the right tab this time and select Administrative Templates --> Windows Components --> Data Collection and Preview Builds.
- Remain to the right tab and search for the setting Allow Telemetry. Now double click the setting, select first in the left corner the Enabled option Now go to Options setting. Select 0 (disabled). Alternatively you can choose 1 required, 2 enhanced, 3 optional. In the right tab you can see an explanation for each option.The higher the number the more data your PC sends.
- Now hit apply and OK and you are done.Your new telemetry settings were applied.
- Press Windows + R, type regedit into the box and click OK.
- Go to the left tab and select the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE.
- Expand it and follow the path HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE --> SOFTWARE --> Policies --> Microsoft --> Windows --> DataCollection.
- In the right panel select Allow Telemetry and set the Value Data to 0. These are the same values that we saw earlier when we used the Local Group Policy Editor. Press OK, close the registry editor and restart your PC. Remember that if you are a Windows home user you can not set the value to 0. This is an option for Windows 10 Pro, Enterprise and Education users.
- Use open source software. For example you can substitute Microsofts default browser and use Mozilla Firefox instead and Windows Media player with the VLC video player
- You can encrypt your files or folders and even your hard drive
- Disable the windows firewall and use another firewall
- Disable Windows Updates - See our previous guide 1
- Disable Cortana - See our previous guide 2
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