14 DAY TRIAL // Microsoft was heavily criticized for the way it pushed Windows 10, with many users and organizations alike blasting the company for being so aggressive with an upgrade that was supposed to be optional in the first place.
The Get Windows 10 app, which was developed from the very beginning to provide a smoother way to upgrade from Windows 7 and 8.1 to Windows 10 by automatically downloading the necessary files, proved to be a huge pain in the neck for users, especially because in some cases, the whole thing happened without their consent.
This is how, despite refusing the upgrade to Windows 10, some users ran out of storage space or even bandwidth, simply because the Get Windows 10 app downloaded several gigabytes of data to prepare the PC for the new operating system.
In the recent months, however, Microsoft has made several changes to prevent forced upgrades, and now the company promises that whenever new OS versions are released, files will no longer be downloaded without users’ consent.
Microsoft: No more forced upgrades
It happened in Germany, where the consumer protection watchdog started an investigation and looked into how Microsoft handled Windows 10 upgrades. The company acknowledged (in German) that not everything went as it was supposed to and promised to address the problem when new OS versions are released, pledging not to download files for new operating system unless users specifically agree with it.
German officials emphasized that this particular case should serve as an example for all the other companies, as forcing consumers to install software is not a practice consumer watchdogs agree with.
Truth be told, the forced upgrades have until now caused pretty big problems to Microsoft, including a lawsuit that the company lost in mid-2016. The software giant agreed to pay $10,000 in damages to Teri Goldstein of Sausalito, California who complained that her computer was automatically upgraded to Windows 10, making it substantially slower and impacting the work she was doing at her travel agency.