Will Windows Insiders find Recall lurking under the Christmas tree?

Satya Claus has something special for all the good little girls and boys

Microsoft's next deadline for shipping its controversial Recall technology to Windows Insiders is fast approaching. Following a privacy outcry and mushrooming conspiracy theories, will the service ever be ready for users?

Microsoft announced Windows Recall in May, partly as a way of encouraging users to snap up Copilot+ PCs. However, judging by the reaction to the tech, many perceived it as a privacy minefield.

Recall's purpose is to allow users to step back to anything that happened recently on their Copilot+ PC. To do this, it took snapshots of the user's desktop, parsed what was in the snapshot using AI, and allowed the user to search for that activity.

It all sounded marvelous, but the cracks were evident immediately. Passwords and confidential information could be grabbed by the technology. Private browsing wasn't respected, at least initially, in anything other than Edge or a Chromium browser. Hackers were soon able to demonstrate how data stored locally by the service could be extracted. Observers wondered whether the privacy nightmare was actually a neat internal engineering demo seized upon by marketing desperate to find a killer AI application.

Days before the preview experience was due to become more widely available on Copilot+ PCs, Microsoft blinked in the face of criticism and postponed it. In June, it was due to appear as a preview for Windows Insiders "in the coming weeks." By August, Microsoft said Windows Insiders would get their hands on the technology in October. October came, and Insiders were told they would have to wait until December.

Microsoft's official reason for the delay is "taking additional time to refine the experience before previewing it with Windows Insiders." It seems likely, however, that various operating system components weren't ready for local AI processing and the updates necessitated by the customer feedback have taken longer than hoped.

The problem Microsoft has is that the waves generated by Recall continue to roll. It can't simply lock it away in a cupboard because its abrupt removal from Windows 11 generated its own share of controversy. Traces of the technology linger in the latest release of Windows 11, leading commentators to highlight dependencies more likely caused by error and a long-winded build process rather than a conspiracy to force the technology onto unwitting users.

That said, anyone aware of how deeply Internet Explorer roots stretched across Windows will have noted recent reports of seemingly unconnected applications, such as File Explorer, suddenly appearing to sprout dependencies on Recall.

The situation has increased the pressure on Microsoft to deliver on its promises to make Recall a secure, opt-in experience, as well as allowing users to retain the ability to uninstall the service.

Microsoft has only a few weeks left before Windows Insiders are due to receive the update, so a public release is unlikely until 2025. Unless, of course, Microsoft opts to delay Recall yet again. ®