OFB Community Mailing Lists

[Josiah Ritchie]

On Thu, 2004-05-20 at 20:22, N. Thompson wrote:
> It has in the past downloaded windows update without asking me, and I do 
> have it set up to index the file on the hard drive for faster searching 
> but I don't see why it would need to do that all the time while its idle.
> 
> I do have anti-virus however the automatic tests are scheduled for 6:30 
> AM so that would not explain what my computer does at night when its idle.
> 
> As for Windows calling home to Redmond I thought about that myself 
> because of the increased liberty Microsoft has taken in invading 
> people's privacy (DRM and palladium for example) however I cannot say 
> that for certain and unless I have significant reason to believe that is 
> the case I shouldn't cause any trouble over speculation.

If you are concerned about network traffic, you could always setup and
old linux box with tcpdump and record the traffic one evening to see
what is going off of it. You can do this with a 486 with 2 NICs or one
if there is a hub between your win computer and the ISP you have access
to. tcpdump is a great tool. 

JSR/