Cue the accusations of tinfoil hats.
Right now, you're all probably scrambling to comment on the latest details of how the Xbox One allows you to lend games (no fee! Yay!), play games via the cloud, and all that jazz. However, something is being swept beneath the rug. The timing of this is all-too-coincidental.
Mere minutes (yes, minutes) before Microsoft uploaded their list of policies and terms for the Xbox One, Washington Post made an article, which can be found here: http://www.washingtonpost.c...
Read it for yourself, but I will post select quotes and allow you to draw your own conclusions:
"The National Security Agency and the FBI are tapping directly into the central servers of nine leading U.S. Internet companies, extracting audio, video, photographs, e-mails, documents and connection logs that enable analysts to track a person’s movements and contacts over time."
Hmmm. Interesting. This is nothing new, I suppose. Even though I don't like it. We've known about this sort of stuff since 9/11. Moving on...
"NSA reporting increasingly relies on PRISM [the program used to mine data]” as its leading source of raw material, accounting for nearly 1 in 7 intelligence reports."
Interesting once again. So, this data-mining provides raw material for nearly 15% of all intelligence reports. Seems pretty important to me. Moving along...
"They [the companies participating in PRISM] are listed on a roster that bears their logos in order of entry into the program: “Microsoft, Yahoo, Google, Facebook, PalTalk, AOL, Skype, YouTube, Apple."
BOOM.
KA-freakin'-BOOM
You think Microsoft won't share any information from their Xbox Live servers? You think that the NSA - which is already mining video, audio, messages, and log-in data from Microsoft - isn't going to access information gleaned from Xbox One? Microsoft has been a part of the PRISM program from the very start (as indicated by their first spot on the list, as the article points out).
Kids, you are inviting the wolf into your home. I'm not a conspiracy theorist. I don't believe in chemtrails or poison in the water or death-camps in the middle of Iowa (that's fine if you do; I don't). Microsoft already got in trouble last year for spying on Skype conversations (here: http://www.globalpost.com/d... and also here: http://www.esecurityplanet.... With this article, we have confirmation that Microsoft already co-operates with third parties (in this case, the NSA) to provide your personal and private information.
You can make a choice. Either stand up for your rights as a consumer and a private citizen, or sell yourself (and anyone living with you) down the river so that you can play the latest Forza and watch the newest episode of Halo TV. The choice is yours, and if you're the sort of person who doesn't care about privacy, so be it. That's your own choice. HOwever, for those of us who do care about privacy, this information should not be kept under the rug. People should be aware that Xbox One will almost certainly be used to passively mine data from its users.
Xbox One, stop spying.
Thank you for reading. If you have any thoughts, concerns, or comments, feel free to post below.
Microsoft announced its financial results for Q3 of fiscal year 2026, including an update on its gaming Xbox business and more.
Not looking good. Hopefully Asha Sharma is able to turn Phil’s disaster around.
To me it's still quite remarkable how they can cash-in 5.3bn in revenue in a single quarter, since their hardware is basically dead.
The stock mark is what makes Microsoft remarkable, They have convinced every institutional and retail investor to just keep piling money into them. Like many big tech giants they are just a big growing pyramid scheme. As long as people keep dropping money into ETF's that cover the market Microsoft will always be liquid. At the same time it is completely stifling innovation and competition. People need to start being more discreet in how they invest their money as it's killing the system.
Riiiiight because people will just flock back to them for one or two games per year.
15+ years of bad performance is what they call irreparable in business. It is time for them to sell off the assets and get out of entertainment.
These declines are on the back of extra revenue received from releasing games like Forza horizon 5 on PlayStation. So I’m being sarcastic here when I said they should go back to exclusives. Killing off a revenue stream from Ps5 sales will only make things worse
The charity event will be streamed live from Gamescom in August.
Thanks to the slip-up of an artist working on the title, we now have more evidence that a new Injustice game is in the works.
I just start to think this console (Xbone) is a sort of Trojan horse ...
Your privacy is not safe with anyone. Google sells your infor everyday. Everyday. Every phone call, every app purchase. All the info you put into the apps. Every web search. Every website you visit. Every video you download. Every video you upload.
Facebook has all of your info on its servers. Birthday. All your family you have tagged. Your address. Phone numbers. Where you work. Same with Apple.
Do I agree with what Microsoft is doing. Not really. My problem is people, on the interwebz, want to all of a sudden get in a tizzy as if Microsoft is doing something no one has seen before. They are just following the trend.
Why is there no public outcry over everyone else? They make you sign agreements before you even use their software. Some of the agreements even state they can use your info however they want to. People sign away so they can have the latest phone, or ipad, or app. It's sad. Pictures you take with your cell phone CAN BE USED. Your actual camera CAN BE USED to spy on you. Any conversation. Every text. Every sext. Everything. People just let it slide.
Sony tried to sneak DRM into their music and it got into people's personal computers. It cost Sony dearly. I think they kind of learned their lesson about it so that is why they are taking the approach they are taking. Microsoft has a long road ahead of them if they cant see the smoke.
Nice info by the way.
The "threat" Kinect poses isn't as dramatic as the FBI and NSA data mining, but rather MS doing it themselves for the purposes of marketing. The fact that it is so intrusive as to be a camera that can see in the dark, read your face and measure your heart rate. By comparison checking your online transactions, what games and videos you download, is nothing.
Since Kinect was natal MS has been talking about how to utilize the tech for advertising, and that's part of the reason they've required an always online connection.
And then there's the sad counterargument of since you are being watched and monitored everywhere else, why not put an outside camera in your home. The judicial system needs to be reinserted back into the surveillance process again, warrants should be needed before such official monitoring takes place, but that's going to be harder to do with instances of MS selling off your family's preferences to the likes of McDonald's for ad space.