I’m not sure what Microsoft was thinking, but apparently there’s code floating around their Visual Studio 2015 compiler that gets inserted into anything that it compiles which “phones home” to Microsoft:
Recently Reddit user “sammiesdog” posted claims that Visual Studio’s C++ compiler was automatically adding function calls to Microsoft’s telemetry services. The screenshotaccompanying their post showed how a simple 5 line CPP file produced an assembly language file that included a function call titled “telemetry_main_invoke_trigger”.
The ensuing discussion then revolved around how to disable this unannounced “feature” while also speculating its purpose. “sammiesdog” noted that this appears in release builds, while user “ssylvan” also indicated that it appeared in debug builds too. The telemetry function is intended to communicate with ETW.
Now, what’s ETW you ask? Here’s a primer that explains what it is and why this is an issue:
- ETW can and is sometimes used as part of solutions for remote telemetry.
- These events are coming from the program itself whenever the CRT is statically linked into the program.
- It’s called telemetry.
#Fail Microsoft. When the software giant was called on this, here’s what they said:
InfoQ reached out to Microsoft to confirm whether or not this default behavior exists in Visual Studio “15” and according to a Microsoft spokesperson while this behavior does currently exist in “15”, it will be removed in a future preview release. However, a timetable for removal has not been provided. VS2012 and VS2013 do not include this telemetry behavior.
One part of me says that this may have been unintended. But the more cynical part of me says that Microsoft will learn from this and hide it better in the future. Either way, the optics suck given the current climate that exists when it comes to this sort of thing.
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This entry was posted on June 10, 2016 at 10:27 am and is filed under Commentary with tags Microsoft. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.
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#Fail: Visual Studio 2015 Inserts Code Into Complied Apps That “Phones Home”
I’m not sure what Microsoft was thinking, but apparently there’s code floating around their Visual Studio 2015 compiler that gets inserted into anything that it compiles which “phones home” to Microsoft:
Recently Reddit user “sammiesdog” posted claims that Visual Studio’s C++ compiler was automatically adding function calls to Microsoft’s telemetry services. The screenshotaccompanying their post showed how a simple 5 line CPP file produced an assembly language file that included a function call titled “
telemetry_main_invoke_trigger”.The ensuing discussion then revolved around how to disable this unannounced “feature” while also speculating its purpose. “sammiesdog” noted that this appears in release builds, while user “ssylvan” also indicated that it appeared in debug builds too. The telemetry function is intended to communicate with ETW.
Now, what’s ETW you ask? Here’s a primer that explains what it is and why this is an issue:
#Fail Microsoft. When the software giant was called on this, here’s what they said:
InfoQ reached out to Microsoft to confirm whether or not this default behavior exists in Visual Studio “15” and according to a Microsoft spokesperson while this behavior does currently exist in “15”, it will be removed in a future preview release. However, a timetable for removal has not been provided. VS2012 and VS2013 do not include this telemetry behavior.
One part of me says that this may have been unintended. But the more cynical part of me says that Microsoft will learn from this and hide it better in the future. Either way, the optics suck given the current climate that exists when it comes to this sort of thing.
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This entry was posted on June 10, 2016 at 10:27 am and is filed under Commentary with tags Microsoft. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.