Privacy Settings Change With Updates

I'm sure the forum experts can give some very good feedback in response to this question. Due to the fact I'm beginning to feel somewhat paranoid over my privacy concerns, I'd like to hear from others as well. I need some assurance that I haven't gone off the deep end.

I've noticed in the past, and yet again today, that many of the privacy settings for Win 10 that I had turned off are on again. This happens with every new update. My question: Does that mean Microsoft is not to be trusted? (I don't expect many to stick their neck out on this one. That's OK).

And after all I did to remove Cortana, it's back. I will never want this app and one 'No' should be enough.

There are some wonderful third party apps out there that will, free of cost, help you undo much of the bovine excrement Microsoft loads to your computer. I'm so hoping someone is in the process of writing software that with one click will reset all your settings, particularly privacy settings, back to the way you had them.

...Or maybe someone knows of a way to save all settings and execute them after each update? I'm no programmer and may be asking for the impossible. I can dream, can't I?

And while I'm ranting.... I have chosen which apps I want to open all my files. After each update, I am asked which one I want to open them. I have to reset my choices all over, again. This should not be. If I decide to use a Windows app to open a file, I will make the change without any help.

[Reverend Jim]

Does that mean Microsoft is not to be trusted?

Why focus on just that? There are so many other reasons to not trust Microsoft. Aside from Cortana, I've noticed that OneDrive keeps coming back. Fortunately I can make it go away quickly by importing DisbleOneDrive.reg which contains

REGEDIT4

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\CLSID\{018D5C66-4533-4307-9B53-224DE2ED1FE6}]
@="OneDrive"
"System.IsPinnedToNameSpaceTree"=dword:00000000
"SortOrderIndex"=dword:00000042

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\CLSID\{018D5C66-4533-4307-9B53-224DE2ED1FE6}\DefaultIcon]
@=hex(2):25,53,79,73,74,65,6d,52,6f,6f,74,25,5c,73,79,73,74,65,6d,33,32,5c,69,\
  6d,61,67,65,72,65,73,2e,64,6c,6c,2c,2d,31,30,34,33,00

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\CLSID\{018D5C66-4533-4307-9B53-224DE2ED1FE6}\InProcServer32]
@=hex(2):25,73,79,73,74,65,6d,72,6f,6f,74,25,5c,73,79,73,74,65,6d,33,32,5c,73,\
  68,65,6c,6c,33,32,2e,64,6c,6c,00

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\CLSID\{018D5C66-4533-4307-9B53-224DE2ED1FE6}\Instance]
"CLSID"="{0E5AAE11-A475-4c5b-AB00-C66DE400274E}"

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\CLSID\{018D5C66-4533-4307-9B53-224DE2ED1FE6}\Instance\InitPropertyBag]
"Attributes"=dword:00000011
"TargetKnownFolder"="{a52bba46-e9e1-435f-b3d9-28daa648c0f6}"

[HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\CLSID\{018D5C66-4533-4307-9B53-224DE2ED1FE6}\ShellFolder]
"FolderValueFlags"=dword:00000028
"Attributes"=dword:f080004d

I also have one named turn-off-cortana.reg

REGEDIT4

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\Windows Search]
"AllowCortana"=dword:00000000

[rproffitt]

Thanks Jim. If folk did want to move to something a bit private they'd have to pack up and leave the Internet as we know it.

Disclosure: I use Windows, TAILS (the OS), Android, and so many things that my leaks must be extra large.

"There are so many other reasons to not trust Microsoft".

Thank you

I focused on what I did because it was of interest to me. I hoped to open a dialogue pertaining to matters with which I have issues.

Cortana is only one problem. As my post title indicates, I am concerned that my privacy settings are changed with each new update and that my app settings are changed as well.

I was in hopes of hearing from others as to whether they had this problem, how they felt about it and what, if anything, they did about it.

[rproffitt]

OK so I'll share what I did about it.

1. I use a local login on Windows. That email system looks fragile and leaky.
2. When I travel I boot up TAILS.
3. I don't do much with my smart phone other than demo our apps. Just talk, text, our apps and no email there.

[Reverend Jim]

Ditto on local logins and cell phone. Although there is no way to stop Windows from sending my local userid/password (or anything else really) back to Microsoft other than turning off my modem.

[rproffitt]

@MickeyD and RJ.

Because I don't use the email login I completely forget about what is synced across the machines and that may be what some think is spying or leakage. Again, I don't use the email login but many do and it's going to sync (leak?) a lot of data.

Here's another one: Clipboard Sync. https://www.howtogeek.com/509323/disable-clipboard-sync-across-devices-in-windows-10/ notes a few ways to disable that.

[Reverend Jim]

I never use sync across machines. If I want to maintain consistency across machines I use Resilio Sync. It's a direct connection between machines (data never goes to an intermediate server), transmission is always across the shortest available path (on local machines all traffic never goes past my router), and all data is encrypted before being sent.

It's free for personal use. I find it especially useful to share very large files (too bit to email) with my son in the UK. Yes, Firefox Send will handle big files, but Resilio handles the encryption and will halt/resume as connections are made/broken.