- Joined
- Aug 20, 2006
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- 13,000
Are you an idiot for turning off Windows Update? Yeah, you are, according to this author, who (after all of the WannaCry stuff) has decided to point out some of the bad advice that is out there: particularly, one CNET article that teaches users how to stop Windows 10 from automatically updating their PCs. While Windows Update could still see some improvement, isn’t this guy right? Naysayers suggest that it is not so simple, since Microsoft is mixing in potentially unwanted updates with security updates, aside from other supposed inconveniences.
When you position this article from a year ago next to the hundreds of thousands of machines that have just had their files encrypted, it's hard to conclude that it in any way constitutes good advice. I had the author of this post ping me and suggest that people should just manually update their things if they disabled Windows Update. That's fine in, say, a managed desktop environment such as many organizations run and let's be clear - disabling Windows Update isn't the issue in that situation because there are professionals managing the rollout of patches (with the obvious exception of the organizations that just got hit by WannaCry). But your average person is simply not going to keep on top of these things which is why auto-updaters are built into so many software products these days.
When you position this article from a year ago next to the hundreds of thousands of machines that have just had their files encrypted, it's hard to conclude that it in any way constitutes good advice. I had the author of this post ping me and suggest that people should just manually update their things if they disabled Windows Update. That's fine in, say, a managed desktop environment such as many organizations run and let's be clear - disabling Windows Update isn't the issue in that situation because there are professionals managing the rollout of patches (with the obvious exception of the organizations that just got hit by WannaCry). But your average person is simply not going to keep on top of these things which is why auto-updaters are built into so many software products these days.