Microsoft’s contentious Windows Recall feature is making a return.
The tech giant recently revealed in an official blog post that the feature will be available to testers in the Windows Insider Program starting in October. Once it’s fully developed, the feature is expected to then roll out to all Copilot Plus PCs — though, there’s still no exact timeline provided for it.
“As previously shared on June 13, we have adjusted our release approach to leverage the valuable expertise of our Windows Insider community prior to making Recall available for all Copilot+ PCs. Security continues to be our top priority and when Recall is available for Windows Insiders in October we will publish a blog with more details,” Microsoft’s updated blog post reads.
Windows Recall uses artificial intelligence to capture snapshots of all your PC activities and keep a detailed record history of everything you’ve done on your computer. This allows you to revisit anything from products, emails, and documents to chats displayed on your screen.
The feature is great if you spend extensive hours on your PC and need to often go back to action that took place a while back, but it’s also a privacy nightmare. Despite Microsoft’s reassurances that it’s completely safe, if someone were to gain access to your PC, they wouldn’t just be able to rummage through your traditional file system – they could also view every action you’ve taken on your computer from the moment Recall was activated.
When the feature was announced, critics also weren’t happy that Recall’s data was unencrypted and that the feature didn’t mask sensitive information such as passwords or banking details.
Microsoft later said it’s making it an op-in feature, rather than it being automatically enabled when setting up a Copilot+ PC.
Additionally, the company announced that Windows Recall would require Windows Hello, a face or fingerprint scan, and it would use “just in time” decryption, which only unlocks the data when accessed through Hello. This means that if a hacker gains access to your computer, your screenshot timeline should stay encrypted unless they can bypass Hello’s encryption or you inadvertently unlock it.
Microsoft says it’ll publish a new blog post with more information in October, when the Windows Recall feature becomes available through the Windows 11 Insider Program.