This oft-repeated chestnut is normally levelled at free cloud-based services like Google's Gmail, Docs, Drive, and the like, but Microsoft seems to be bound and determined to ensure that it gets applied to Windows 10, too.
From Computerworld:
Microsoft today updated the Windows 10 beta, switching on a controversial technology that commandeers users' upload bandwidth to shift some responsibility for updating from the company's own servers.
Build 14915 was released earlier Wednesday to participants in the Windows Insider "Fast" track.
The notable change highlighted by Dona Sarkar, the software engineer who acts as the public face of Insider, was the enabling of Windows 10's "Delivery Optimization" technology.
Delivery Optimization, formally dubbed "Windows Update Delivery Optimization" (WUDO) by Microsoft, was part of Windows 10 from the get-go. But it was only switched on as of the November 2015 upgrade, which was pegged as 1511. Insider builds of Windows 10, however, were exempt until now.
[...]
WUDO resembles BitTorrent in its basics, and like that file-sharing technology, uses a peer-to-peer delivery system to spread the load to PCs worldwide rather than relying on a centralized-servers model. WUDO is not a substitute for Microsoft's standard delivery service, Windows Update, but is in addition to it.
If WUDO is enabled, Microsoft can point others to locally-cached copies of updates and apps on users' Windows 10 devices that are connected to the Internet. When that happens, a user's Windows 10 PC acts as a substitute server for others, and any customer whose device is tapped for WUDO delivery has given Microsoft access to their upload bandwidth.
That appropriation of bandwidth has led to criticism, most of it focused on the fact that WUDO was enabled by default. To opt out, users must modify Windows 10's preferences.
Yes, Microsoft will simply appropriate your bandwidth, by default, at your expense, and to nobody's benefit except theirs. In fact, they're probably already doing it. I wonder whether gamers, whose hobby revolves around having adequate bandwidth and computational cycles available, feel about Microsoft commandeering their system resources in a bit to keep costs down?
Because that's what WUDO does: it allows Microsoft to save money on the servers which would normally be serving updates to users. Which is essential, since updates are pushed to most users from Microsoft by fiat, affected large numbers of users simultaneously. WUDO costs you money, so Redmond can save money, which means that they may as well be taking money right out of your pockets and putting in their own. It would qualify theft, except that there's almost certainly some impenetrably-worded clause in Windows 10's EULA or TOS which Redmond will interpret as you having given them permission to do this, whether or not WUDO is actually referenced specifically.
Also, since Windows 10 can (and will) reset your preferences to Microsoft's defaults during the updates that they can force on you at will, changing your preferences to turn off WUDO doesn't necessarily safeguard your bandwidth. Even if you opt out, Microsoft can opt you back in, and resume siphoning off your bandwidth and CPU cycles for their own benefit, not only without your knowledge or informed consent, but in defiance of your clearly expressed decision not to participate in their pseudo-Torrent network.
Seriously, Microsoft, fuck you.
#fuckyoumicrosoft