And by settings you mean undocumented registry entries that people found and altered to break core services on purpose? If you start altering undocumented things there's no real assurances that it will work the same way (or state maintained) during an update.

> Microsoft still didn't document what data they are exfiltrating

Basic diagnostic data: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/configuration/basic...

Full diagnostic data: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/configuration/windo...

> silent updates, that you cannot control them or disable them

You get plenty of control over updates including how "silent" they are, you just cannot disable them entirely.

But is limiting the ability to disable them for the greater good? We still have huge Windows XP botnets running rampant on the internet because people would completely disable updates, get infected, and then start causing harm to their neighbors.

I've read quite a few people that want to disable Windows Update, but they never provide a plan or route for receiving security updates. They just simply opt to run an insecure machine because an update annoyed them one time, and that would be fine if it didn't impact others.