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posted by martyb on Wednesday June 17 2020, @08:52PM   Printer-friendly
from the Sabaku-Taisō dept.

Andy Maxwell over at TorrentFreak informs us Removing "Annoying" Windows 10 Features is a DMCA Violation, Microsoft Says:

Ninjutsu OS, a new software tool that heavily modifies Windows 10 with a huge number of tweaks, mods and extra tools, has been hit with a DMCA complaint by Microsoft. According to the copyright notice, the customizing, tweaking and disabling of Windows 10 features, even when that improves privacy, amounts to a violation of Microsoft's software license.

Since Windows was first released, people have been modifying variants of the world-famous operating system to better fit their individual requirements.

Many of these tweaks can be carried out using tools provided within the software itself but the recently-released Ninjutsu OS aims to take Windows 10 modding to a whole new level.

Released on May 7, Ninjutsu OS claims to take Windows 10 and transform it into a penetration testing powerhouse, adding huge numbers of tools (around 800) aimed at security experts, a few for regular users (qBitTorrent and Tor Browser, for example) while also removing features considered unwanted or unneeded in such an environment.

[...] According to the complaint, the above actions by Ninjutsu OS as mentioned on its Github page provide a "work around technical restrictions of the software", something which supposedly violates Microsoft's software license terms.

[...] "As such, we request that you please act expeditiously to remove or disable access to the specific pages/links described above, and thereby prevent the illegal reproduction and distribution of Microsoft content, via your company's network, pursuant to 17 U.S.C. §512(d)," the DMCA complaint adds.

At first view, some may conclude that Ninjutsu OS amounts to a heavily modified yet pirated version of Windows 10. However, a video explaining how the software works [24m28s] suggests that users will actually need their own license for a genuine copy of Windows 10 to get the modifications up and running properly. Ninjutsu's creator informs TF that's indeed the case.


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  • (Score: 3, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 17 2020, @09:05PM (16 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 17 2020, @09:05PM (#1009287)

    Gee, I used gparted to remove the annoying features of Microsoft, by repartitioning the SSD in my new laptop. Did I break the law?

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  • (Score: 2, Insightful) by fustakrakich on Wednesday June 17 2020, @09:08PM (15 children)

    by fustakrakich (6150) on Wednesday June 17 2020, @09:08PM (#1009289) Journal

    Yes, it's like removing the tag from your mattress

    --
    La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..
    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 17 2020, @09:14PM (2 children)

      by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 17 2020, @09:14PM (#1009290)

      That's a serious offense. Who would do such a heinous thing?

      • (Score: 2) by DannyB on Wednesday June 17 2020, @09:47PM (1 child)

        by DannyB (5839) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday June 17 2020, @09:47PM (#1009307) Journal

        Serious and heinous indeed! Like removing the cellophane wrapping from a new smartphone.

        --
        People today are educated enough to repeat what they are taught but not to question what they are taught.
        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 18 2020, @06:24AM

          by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 18 2020, @06:24AM (#1009452)

          It's worse than that. I left the UEFI partition, so on boot, it tells me my system is broken. And I laugh, and laugh, and laugh, before hitting the button to book MX Linux. Yes, I know, torture is wrong. But they drew first Blue Screen!

    • (Score: 4, Informative) by Grishnakh on Wednesday June 17 2020, @10:43PM (11 children)

      by Grishnakh (2831) on Wednesday June 17 2020, @10:43PM (#1009320)

      Sorry to be a wet blanket, and I know this was supposed to be a joke, but the mattress tag thing never made any sense. Anyone who's literate could read the things and see that they clearly state that the consumer (i.e. purchaser) is allowed to remove them. They're just strongly worded so that retailers or other middlemen don't take them off. I don't know why this was ever a thing, especially for decades. Can people not read?

      • (Score: 5, Funny) by RandomFactor on Wednesday June 17 2020, @10:57PM

        by RandomFactor (3682) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday June 17 2020, @10:57PM (#1009323) Journal

        Can people not read?

        So, you didn't chose that career in end-user support I see.

        --
        В «Правде» нет известий, в «Известиях» нет правды
      • (Score: 4, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 17 2020, @11:29PM (1 child)

        by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 17 2020, @11:29PM (#1009332)

        Wiki:

        The government study indicated that 21 to 23 percent of adult Americans were "not able to locate information in text", could "not make low-level inferences using printed materials", and were "unable to integrate easily identifiable pieces of information." About one-fourth of the individuals who performed at this level reported that they were born in another country, and some were recent immigrants with a limited command of English. Sixty-two percent of the individuals on that level of the prose scale said they had not completed high school, and 35 percent had no more than eight years of education. A relatively-high percentage of the respondents at this level were African American, Hispanic, or Asian/Pacific Islander, and about 33 percent were age 65 or older.

        https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Literacy_in_the_United_States [wikipedia.org]

        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday June 27 2020, @04:51PM

          by Anonymous Coward on Saturday June 27 2020, @04:51PM (#1013293)

          You post is excessively raciest in light of the current All Lives Matter global campaign.
          Post an apology. Now.

      • (Score: 2, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 17 2020, @11:56PM (3 children)

        by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday June 17 2020, @11:56PM (#1009342)

        As someone who worked in the court system. No, they cannot. And I'm not just counting the cases involving people suing who ignored warning of all types. I am also including the surprisingly large number of people who couldn't do basic things like "Write your name after the colon in this sentence:" or "please summarize the reason for your lawsuit" or "what is your address and zip code" or "Please check to make sure you didn't bring knives, guns, explosives, or drugs before attempting to enter the security area." For goodness sake, so many people parked in front of "NO PARKING OR STANDING ON THIS STREET, ALL VIOLATIONS WILL BE TOWED" signs that the tow trucks on busy days would literally drive a circuit between hooking a car there and dropping it off at their lots for hours straight.

        • (Score: 3, Insightful) by NateMich on Thursday June 18 2020, @12:19AM (2 children)

          by NateMich (6662) on Thursday June 18 2020, @12:19AM (#1009353)

          For goodness sake, so many people parked in front of "NO PARKING OR STANDING ON THIS STREET, ALL VIOLATIONS WILL BE TOWED" signs that the tow trucks on busy days would literally drive a circuit between hooking a car there and dropping it off at their lots for hours straight.

          That's an entirely different issue and has nothing to do with reading comprehension. It has a lot to do with the lack of parking in cities however.

          • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 18 2020, @03:11AM (1 child)

            by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 18 2020, @03:11AM (#1009407)

            Literally across the street was a parking garage and free street parking a block away.

            • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 18 2020, @06:06AM

              by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 18 2020, @06:06AM (#1009448)

              Yeah, but where were the elementary schools, and teachers, who taught things like sign reading and comprehension? Betsy DeVos's Amway schools, that's where they were at, teaching that God is a white man who loves children, and happens to be married to Betsy.

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 18 2020, @01:22AM (2 children)

        by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 18 2020, @01:22AM (#1009370)

        Current POTUS is a sad example that, indeed, people can't read (for the toddler in chief, can't speak, can't think, etc. too).

      • (Score: 2) by DannyB on Thursday June 18 2020, @01:35PM

        by DannyB (5839) Subscriber Badge on Thursday June 18 2020, @01:35PM (#1009518) Journal

        I know this was supposed to be a joke, but the mattress tag thing never made any sense.

        Hello, I am an inspector from the right wing department of bedroom correctness. I am here to inspect your bedroom to be sure that there are no indication of wrong things that would offend the right.

        Violation #1: I see your mattress does not have a tag warning you of something that should be common sense.

        Can you PROVE one of:
        1. You are not the one who removed the tag?
        2. If you did remove the tag, that you are definitely the original purchaser of this 19 year old mattress? Hopefully you have kept your receipt properly filed for the length of the life of the mattress.

        While the right may be against regulation in business, they are definitely all about regulation of what goes on in bedrooms.

        --
        People today are educated enough to repeat what they are taught but not to question what they are taught.