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IT departments "anal" for not enabling auto update? I don't think so!
According to present Microsoft licensing, they think they have a right to know what is on your computer "to be sure you're not running unlicensed software products" to paraphrase. In addition, according to some people who have claimed to have analyzed the byte stream when they have the "auto update" "feature" enabled, Microsoft may already be taking advantage of that "right." (This was introduced in the Windows 2000 Service Pack 3 and exists in all XP licenses as well).
For corporations or other organizations with a tight information security need, this is *not* a minor matter. For example, there have been some rather serious questions raised about this by IT directors in the healthcare industry, since HIPAA regulations say that sharing information covered under that law is subject to both civil and criminal penalties. While Microsoft may be relatively benign, there is simply no guarantee or limit to the information they may extract in this manner.
FYI, this is a real concern not only in the healthcare field but for defense contractors and others whose computers contain highly sensitive information. Besides, experience teaches that if such a facility exists in Windows, it can likely be exploited by people more sinister than Microsoft (can anybody say "Swen"??).
Furthermore, various of Microsoft's "improvements" may break some business-critical software that takes advantage of a feature which is now missing or broken. We are probably all familiar with service pack "fixes" that may not have worked--but which often broke other things that weren't broken before. Thus, IT departments in enterprise-level organizations will *test* new changes to the software before deployment rather than trust Microsoft automatically. Frankly, if they did not they would be subject to serious question by their management--and with good reason.
Please, therefore, try to be understanding that it may not be that an IT organization is "anal" at all, but merely competent.
David
-----Original Message from Keri Morgret <morgret -at- operamail -dot- com>-----
Just look at the government and what they approve.. they're usually months behind on approving service packs as appropriate and kosher for use on their computers.
> I find it hard to believe that any IT department would
> frown upon using the native Windows Update feature to
> install critical updates. I've worked with some pretty
> anal IT departments, but all of them strongly
> recommended running the Windows Update feature (or
> setting it up to run automatically) to keep
> workstations up to date and safe.
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