Be Excellent To Each Other

My dad believes that OneDrive is always scanning and uploading files to 'The Cloud'. I suggested that it is in fact just uploading what you ask it to, like Dropbox.

He also believes it can serve as a useful backdoor to your info for THE GOVERNMENT and NSA etc with whom Microsoft are IN CAHOOTS.

Is there any truth to the activities of OneDrive re scanning/uploading or is he as paranoid as I think?

There are always going to be inherent issues with trusting cloud backup services. It's all about risk/convenience.

I'm just wondering if it's really uploading things you don't want it to. I bet it isn't.

It isn't.

Thought not. But my dad has read it somewhere in his looking about on internet places for information on things that he wants to/should disable on windows 8. He's paranoid about this sort of thing and I don't think there's any way I could ever convince him otherwise. The amount to which he locks down his pcs makes them almost unusable. Apparently he's thinking of putting XP on this new machine he's got as he can disable more stuff on that...

It is actually the other way, the newer the os the more secure it is.. I think so anyway

YES BUT THE NSA AND CIA AND GCHQ HAVE DIRECT ACCESS TO THE CLOUD!!11!

Yeah, switch to an OS that's soon going to stop getting security patches. That's a sensible plan that will totally keep his secrets private.

Putting XP on a machine nowadays is madness, security-wise.

Well, they do but only stuff you have uploaded, one drive won't be uploading random stuff that he hasn't set it to.

My dad insists it does and sadly I have no way of convincing him otherwise. He's looked you know! He's quite a conspiracy nut these days sadly. It's a shame he's like this as he'll never be satisfied with a modern computer that works well.

OneDrive is different on Windows 8 compared to Windows 7. All the stuff in your one drive folder isn't actually stored on your PC but in the cloud and when you load them, that's when they download to your PC... But only temporarily... I think.

It's weird so I can see where he's coming from. In a way, it IS always scanning as it scans for changes. For instance, I upload a picture from my phone and my PC knows Instantly that it's there.

Or you could, you know, never activate onedrive in the first place.

According to him, it's already activated and impossible to deactivate.

I disagree

http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/oned ... 86c0a01cf6

If he's decidedly wrong and won't change his mind, why don't you just let him get on with whatever he wants to do?

If he's that paranoid just don't connect to the Internet.

If he needs access to Internet then use another pc/chrome book or whatever with nothing on it.

That's what I'd do if I was crazy.

It's kind of difficult as he's wanting to have a PC that works on the internet etc but is so obsessed with trying to disable everything that it gets him really stressed and that's rather a shame. But I suppose there's not much I can do so I'd best let him do what he wants. Which he can't do. But I can't stop him trying...

I think he wants to completely removed it form the system and you need approved installer privilege for that or something.

He just need to log in as an account with admin privileges then follow the uninstall instructions at the top of that article. If he can't manage that, or comes up with some tinfoil hat reason why he shouldn't, then give up because you've done literally as much as you can at that point.

If he is that concerned about privacy etc then maybe the TOR browser? It won't do much for his One Drive concerns but browsing is anonymous.

Yeah he's tried admin privileges and they don't work. You have to have a higher level of privilege. And as for TOR browser that's fine and all that but it doesn't get rid of the 'back doors' to the operating system that microsoft have built in so the NSA can get into your PC.

If you trust microsoft that little, then I wouldn't use windows at all, because if they're that untrustworthy, uninstalling onedrive is easy enough but unlikely to do anything.

Or you could put some kind of sniffer on to see if onedrive is still communicating when off (which, yeah, it won't find anything, by the way)

Or just stop wearing the tinfoil hat.

He's investigated Linux but thinks that the community is too snarky from what he's seen. If he ever needed help he expect he would get either abuse or unhelpful responses, judging by the forums. And there's too many variations to know which is the best to install...

I know I know I'm basically on a hiding to nothing with him.

My dad insists on having a separate PC where he does his accounts that isn't connected to the internet in any way. He's convinced that hackers will get into his machine and steal bank details or something.

Here's the thing though: were such a thing discovered, at least outside the US, all kinds of shit would hit the fan.

And people far more capable than him will have been looking. I for one have not seen anything. Even when I put something in the inactive onedrive folder.

Yeah, that's not true. There are only three levels of account: guest, standard and admin.

He needs the platinum account.

Thinking on it more if your dad can't even manage to log in with an admin account and uninstall a bit of software then he simply doesn't have the basic technical skills required to accomplish what he wants (whatever that is) even if someone does come up with a way to do it. So I think you're on a hiding to nothing both because there's likely no solution that would satisfy him but also because he wouldn't be able to implement it even if there was; both excellent reasons, aside from the obvious, why should just let him get on with it and never, ever get involved yourself.

Because he's his Dad and he loves him?

That said: if he's so worried about OneDrive why doesn't he install Windows 7 which doesn't (I believe) come with OneDrive installed? Better that than XP.

He's quite right there.

"Here is an answer to a question you didn't ask, and a reason why you were wrong to do it your way in the first place"

He should get a Mac, I agree.

I'm not sure why apple would be any less dubious than microsoft.

Because they care.

Bullshit.

Strangely blinkered view of the world. Do you trust Apple just because you've chosen to use their stuff?

Yes, I trust them with my life.

Boooooo-shit.

I should point out that my dad knows perfectly well how to access administrator rights on the PC, it's just this particularly acer machine from PC world requires a higher level than administrator to uninstall certain programs. And yes, maybe Win 7 will be better for him (though he's been reading up on that and doesn't entirely trust that either).

Also 9/11 was a controlled demoliton. NEW WORLD ORDER! ROTHSCHILDS REALLY RUN THE PLANET! CHEMTRAILS! PROJECT BLUE BEAM!

There's still no higher level than local admin

According to him when he logged in as administrator it insisted that you needed something like "privileged installer" right or something. Could it be some kind of add on from PC world?

Nope, if can't.

Are you sure that he said that the PC stated that, or the nice Windows Security man on the phone?

I've never heard of this saying "on a hiding to nothing".

Oh by the way I was slightly wrong about the admin thing. My dad is restricted to user due to the windows being pre installed by Acer as such he doesn't know the password to get in...

He has agreed to put windows 7 on though. Phew.

Windows being preinstalled doesn't matter, on first power up he'll have been walked through the process for creating an account with admin privileges so presumably he's forgotten the username and password he set up there.