Unfortunately, that is standard now in the U.S. Some of the transfer of information is necessary for the software to run, for the company to maintain and improve their software, and to work with third parties like customer service. The problem is that the privacy policy lumps the ability to sell information along with necessary abilities for the software to run. I wish the U.S. was more like Europe.
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As a small sidenote ...
A french kiss is in germany a BJ ... and not a tongue kiss.
So don't wonder if a lot of german guys will pick the french kiss option :-D lol
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I read Steam's a few years ago and it mentioned them collecting information on you and sharing it. I'm pretty sure it even mentioned collecting personal information from your private messages between you and other users. I'm not sure if they ever did anything with the data or if they just had that in there to protect themselves if they ever chose to do something with it. I'm also not sure if it has been changed since then.
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I try to do the same. I have never used any social media sites (mainly because I don't like talking to people) and I try to not put any real info about myself online unless I am placing an order or something to do with banking. I'm sure they have the ability to trace everything back to us by tracking enough identifiers to create a unique ID on us and all our devices. They track all kinds of "anonymous info to identify you like screen resolution, browser version, ad-ons installed, OS version, tracking cookies, and all kinds of other stuff.
There's almost no way around it, they even work with the credit card companies to track where you shop. Privacy for the most part doesn't exist anymore, but there are some people trying to fight it and get laws changed. I guess the best thing anyone can do right now is to just try and limit the amount of info they put about themselves on the internet and not use any smart devices unless necessary, like a phone. Maybe put some random fake info out about yourself every once in a while to pollute their data :)
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Unfortunately it is pretty common these days that companies try to collect everything they can. Some games on steam even come with spyware to collect more information about you. E.g. Red shell. It was removed from some games after made public but not all and I guess since it is no longer in focus there are now more games with red shell or another spyware in it.
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Blizzard owns you in the TOS for Warcraft 3 Reforged: They own exclusive irrevocable use of your custom games and mods.
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Its sad, but whats even worse is that they're probably marketing to a bunch of gamers who don't even read the TOS and don't care how many mods there are, even if most of the modder scene for W3 turns their backs on Reforged.
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There is only one Steam EULA I've fully agreed with, from a now removed game
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Many games have an appalling privacy policy.
The top offenders being typically multiplayer games that require anti-cheat software, as ant-cheat software basically monitors everything in your RAM and can, at its own discretion, send whatever it finds "suspect" back to basecamp for whoever is there to read. Not a good time to unlock your password manager with your bank credentials in it, or your Bitcoin wallet... Anti-cheat software are spyware on steroids: they're the only spyware that will "ban" you for killing them.
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That said, what do you propose?
Sadly, I agree with you that there isn't really a practical solution... the only safe options I see are:
1) don't play multiplayer games that need client-side anti-cheat (some multiplayer games can prevent cheating purely on the server side, Minion Masters comes to mind as an example, and probably most card games as well, and board games, things like that where there is no "viewing your opponents in real time" involved)
or 2) play multiplayer games that require anti-cheat on a dedicated machine, or at least in a dedicated OS install, or at the very least in a dedicated session with nothing sensitive running at the same time
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Yup, privacy usually comes at a cost. Think not disclosing your location to Uber, for instance 👀
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...or people with eyes. Where does the paranoia end?
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Thanks for bringing this. Completely missed out on the Redshell.
As someone who cares about privacy, this is outragerous!
I have some recommendations myself:
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Don't want to scare you, but Windows 10 is the worst in terms of privacy. Last time I tried you couldn't even disable Cortana, without a lot of registry editing.
If you have the time, try switching to Linux. There are many beginner distros that will run faster and have the same features as what you are used to. They do take sometime to get used to.
With that said, Valve is improving the gaming possibilites within linux. There's Proton, which allows many games that are windows only to run great with a click of a button.
There's also Wine, although not as good for games, but has compatibility with apps too.
Finally, you have Lutris to manage your games
Nonetheless Windows should be used only for gaming, because sometimes there is no other way. But for every day 🤮
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Apart from gaming, which is not on par with windows sadly, there are distros that match exactly what you described.
If you are going to do only gaming, Draugeros is the best optimised distro. I haven’t tried yet.
Bonus: a lot of games have open-source equivalent clones, which run fine on linux and are free.
These are other beginner friendly options:
- Solus
- Linux Lite
- Kubuntu
- elementaryOS (for macos aficionados)
Linux is a bit scary in the beginning because of so many distros and options.
Basic terminology:
- Distribution: Linux kernel + windows manager + DE + package manager + optimisations + apps pre-installed
- Package Manager: Installs and manages your packages/libraries, this is a cli (commandline interface) component at its base, but all desktop distros ofter you a graphical package manager. Each will have its own, but they won’t differ much on functionality
- Desktop Environment (DE): graphical user interface (to simplify)
Don’t worry about the distros composition too much, but know that you can change your DE with any. The most beginner friendly I think is KDE Plasma, which comes with the distros above, except elementaryOS. It is beautiful and very customisable.
You will often find that linux applications, are as good or many times actually better than the equivalents on windows. The open-source alternatives do not spy on you. The good thing is, you become less dependent on a particular vendor, and with time not dependent at all.
With that said, customisation is king in linux. Windows doesn’t come even close. If you like to personalise, then there is no contest.
Give it a try on a virtual machine using either Hyper-V or VirtualBox. Then you can move on onto installing on the machine.
Otherwise consider using shindows only to play games, as at least it won’t be able to spy on you with efficiency. Even redshell in that case won’t get much info.
Consider signing this petition
Hope it helps.
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To be honest I don't think there will be a new gaming OS soon. The desktop market is not profitable. Specially with everything in the cloud nowadays.
Until a big company sees some competitive advantage in supporting Linux desktop, I simply don't see it happening. Creating a new stable OS takes decades of perfecting code, not to mention developer traction, thus a LOT of money.
SteamOS tried, but it ultimately fails to reach the masses due to the MS ecosystem:
- Students are offered MS licenses for free from early on, so that's what they grow up with. It takes an huge effort in your life to change your OS. Usually people avoid big changes.
- DirectX is mature. The frameworks are easy to work with, as well as developers already having those skills. Hence that is what developers prefer most of the time. Porting or coding to openGL/Vulkan, takes more effort and money. This is interesting, because most of the market share uses Windows, so developers don't bother porting their games. Until the masses start switch, nothing will really happen. It's a loop.
- Since console games eventually end up on PC, and the only true gaming OS is Windows. In turn increases the games available in this platform, and the cycle continues again!
- MS ecosystem. Just look at what Android and iOS did to their app stores. Not even MS with windows mobile could take on any of them. On mobile, MS got destroyed, but the opposite is true for the desktop. Well stablished platforms are really hard to take down. Just look at what they are doing with the Surface line. They want to tighten you to their brand, just like Apple.
- Windows has become free (at the cost of privacy). This means there is one less reason to switch.
- Inertia. If it is working, don't change. People don't care about anything, not even their privacy. But specially not who's behind what.
For these reasons and probably more, SteamOS can't be competitive enough to take on MS. Perhaps if big gaming companies get together and create a truly open-source OS optimised just for gaming, it could be impactful (looking at you Epic Games). I would actually love to see that.
Glad that at least one person read it :)
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You know.. Most folks would just take my post for what it is. A casual post.
No need to throw insults at someone you know absolutely zero about. That's just plain weird. 😑
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i liked it. but then again i had my stick removed a long time ago.
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Hahah, there we go 😊👍
That reminded me of my old poll answer.
Some times you just gotta put on a happy face...
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some times i think theire just going to control folks mind using theire interests and these information that theyve taken from customers
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yep ..and there is no way to stop it .. its even legal ! i heard it on BBC Persian
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