I'm getting pretty intolerant of the never ending invasion of privacy complaints on the forum. Times have changed and most of us don't want to return to pre internet days. The privacy settings in Windows 10 are easy enough to research and then control but instead some folks would rather carp on about it ad infinitum. There are VPNs widely available to hide IP addresses. A little time with Google and a bit more time exploring the privacy settings and you can set up things the way you would like. But instead, we have complaints about Governments, Microsoft, Google and Apple taking our personal information. This is how it always has been it's just that technology has now industrialised the process. There are freeware alternatives to Microsoft Office and also free OSs for enthusiasts who are willing to spend loads of time getting stuff to work. Corporations are there largely to generate profits and information is one of their tools.
It is apparent (as we said in the Vietnam era days) "You don't know do you?". No one is advocating not having access to the net. What I say (and the royal 'we') is the net has gone over to the dark side of thought spying. I can safely say I can buy Win10 and break it so I can get the updates I want and not get spied on everytime I check my email from an MS server or Gmail server. Probably most people here can. The problem is we're not the relatives and friends IRL requires of all of us. And "THOSE" people won't do that.
Worse than that, is people like you say we should just suffer on because the vast majority of the world is non-tech. I have two paid VPNs, I pay with a rechargeable credit card I charge with cash on trips to the hinterland. I can double route those back through free ones on the web. This does me no good at all if I discuss politics or guns or Hillary or anything else with my photographer friend in Louisiana on his gmail account.
I use ghostery on my browser because I effin hate Google. I have all of Google and their minions blocked in Peerblock address block that a guy on the web maintains and I pay for his time. Ghostery recently decided to go spy mainstream and now attempts to connect to Oracle owned web sites on Amazon cloud addresses EVERY TIME I OPEN THE BROWSER. I paid for Ghostery a while back. I didn't ask for that "feature". Yet here I am dealing with it and you and yours saying "oh that's ok, that's just business".
Right now, the US government and the state of Virginia use Google Analytics. I am REQUIRED to correspond with my government for all activities using a web link now. That web link automatically includes Google knowing I'm doing that. Do you even get that concept at all? I don't give a flying rat's *** if it's anonymized. Google has no right nor contractable right to know I'm contacting my government. That's aside from the concept that its Google that's making the statement "oh we only collect anonymized information." because, you know, EVERYONE trusts Google. Apparently you do because you state; "...A little time with Google and a bit more time exploring the privacy settings and you can set up things the way you would like...". In the real world, why don't you give me all your privacy settings and passwords and let me monitor your correspondence. I am, among other things, a bonded and insured locksmith, and I promise to not tell a soul what you write or forward or I will lose my bond. You know that would hurt me right? to lose my bond? That is aside from having to register with Google to set up privacy settings so Google "promises" to not follow me... much.
As I said, "You don't know do you?" So get used to us carping or don't bother showing up here. We who do know and we who do pay attention, have to spend a large portion of our lives teaching people that think electricity flows through their house wires how to operate dangerous machinery. To follow that analogy, its time that stopped and somebody put a switch on the line so the 'flow' can be shut down by the average person who's not a tech.
