Customize Your Windows 11 Privacy Settings (24H2)

Like its predecessor, Windows 11 violates your privacy by default, and it will do so even more frequently if you let it. And while it provides a sea of privacy-related options to configure, it's not possible to fully disable certain behaviors using the interfaces Microsoft provides. For example, there's no way to prevent Microsoft from collecting telemetry data, which it uses to help make the system more reliable for everyone. Instead, all you can do is minimize the amount of data that Windows 11 collects within the confines that Microsoft has established.

Your first chance to configure your Windows 11 privacy settings and the resulting data collection comes during the Windows 11 Setup Out of Box Experience (OOBE), which appears when you first set up a new PC or perform an upgrade or clean install.

In this screen, you are given the chance to disable several privacy settings, all of which are otherwise enabled by default. Our advice is to disable all of these settings except for "Location," "Find my device," and, if available, "Presence," during the OOBE. But in this chapter, we explain those recommendations further and help you understand where you can correct any mistaken privacy settings configurations you may have made during the initial Windows 11 configuration.
Correctly configure key Windows 11 privacy settings
You review and manage the Windows 11 privacy settings by opening the Settings app and navigating to Privacy & security.

Examining all of these options is tedious, and it's unclear which are the most important to consider changing. That's by design: Though Microsoft provides an incredible list of privacy-related options to consider--an act we call privacy theater--the most obvious and desirable option, for disabling the telemetry data that Windows 11 sends back to Microsoft automatically, is not among them.

Given this, we have repeatedly scoured this mountain of privacy settings to try and determine which are the most deserving of your attention. And we are surprised to report that the several privacy settings that Microsoft presents during the OOBE are, in fact, among the most important. And so the most obvious way you can protect your privacy while using Windows 11 is to configure these settings correctly.

Hopefully, you will make these configuration changes during the OOBE, before you start using Windows 11. But if not, we have your back. Here, we explain where you can find these options in Privacy & security settings. Perhaps not surprisingly, they're spread out all over the place.
Location
When Location services is enabled, Windows provides your location data to apps and services like Widgets and the Weather app that need this information to provide a custom experience. Windows and Microsoft Store apps can individually request to use your location data.

The catch is that Microsoft will also use your location data to improve its location services. But because doing so is mostly innocuous or...