14 DAY TRIAL // The misunderstanding around Microsoft's Services Agreement is starting to trickle into the ordinary life of regular Internet users, with scared torrent tracker admins banning or thinking of banning Windows 10 users from their sites.
We aren't talking about The Pirate Bay, Kickass Torrents, RARBG, or ExtraTorrent here, but the small scene trackers which are so private that it takes 30 minutes of googling just to find what the site acronym stands for, what their URL is, and what the correct sign-up procedure is.
These trackers, along with the release scene, are where most pirated materials first get posted and spread online, and where privacy, security, and anonymity are very crucial factors, helping protect the identity of the people spreading the pirated material online.
If you've been away from your computer this past week, you've probably missed all the talk about Microsoft's new Windows 10 update procedures which, coupled with the company's Services Agreement could allow it to block pirated material and unauthorized hardware.
While the waters are still murky around this issue, with Microsoft staying silent around the topic, and with not a single complaint from one Windows 10 user screaming that he had his downloaded torrents whipped from their hard drive, some pirate tracker admins are already taking some steps to protect themselves, just in case.
iTS admins block users with Windows 10 from their tracker
The first ones to hit the alarm button were the iTS admins, which have started redirecting all Windows 10 users accessing their site to a YouTube video called: Windows 10 is a Tool to Spy on Everything You Do.
Additionally, a statement was sent out to users from which you can also read below:
"Hey there shadows! Many of you might have heard or read about the terrible privacy policy of windows 10 recently. Unfortunately Microsoft decided to revoke any kind of data protection and submit whatever they can gather to not only themselves but also others. One of those is one of the largest anti-piracy company called MarkMonitor.
"Amongst other things windows 10 sends the contents of your local disks directly to one of their servers. Obviously this goes way too far and is a serious threat to sites like ours which is why we had to take measures. Since last Thursday Windows 10 is officially banned from iTS. Members using it get redirected to a video that eggsplains the dangers quite in detail hoping to enlighten as many people as possible.
"Perhaps at some point special versions of Windows 10 will surface that would successfully wipe all those outrageous privacy violations but until then Windows 10 is not welcome here in the interest of this site and all iTS members."
FSC and BB admins are thinking of doing the same
Additionally, according to TorrentFreak, two other similar Dark Web torrent trackers are also considering following suit, with FSC and BB admins publicly expressing their concerns about the abysmal Windows 10 privacy settings.
"As we all know, Microsoft recently released Windows 10. You as a member should know, that we as a site are thinking about banning the OS from FSC," said one of the FSC staff.
Likewise, in a message to their users, a BB admin said something similar, "We have also found [Windows 10] will be gathering information on users’ P2P use to be shared with anti piracy group."
The anti-piracy group the pirate site admins are referring to is MarkMonitor, a US company that specializes in online corporate identity protection, one that is known to have worked with the MPAA in protecting its copyrighted materials, but one that has also worked with Microsoft in the past, to protect Windows users from online identity theft and scam campaigns.
The reaction of everyone involved is very similar to the Y2K debacle, and judging that Microsoft has worked with MarkMonitor in previous versions of Windows should tell you that the pirate site admins are overreacting a bit.
We certainly don't believe Microsoft is going to commit reputational suicide by messing with user files, may them be pirated or not. Let's not forget Windows 10 is an operating system, not our parents, and there's always Linux or Mac around the corner.