I am sure you have heard of Microsoft’s recent feature named “Recall” in Windows 11. It was recently announced it will be arriving on some new Microsoft PCs. However, you must be using a Copilot+ branded PC, which is something only the very latest PCs have. So, your current computer will not have Recall…at this time.
First, let us take a look at what Recall is, and does. If Recall is enabled on your PC, it will take a screenshot of your computer screen every few seconds and save them on your PC. It will allow you to search and find websites, images, or some other types of content you previously viewed on your computer. It will be using natural language queries, making it easier to locate lost or forgotten items. Depending on your memory abilities, this could be quite useful. As in my case as my memory is slowing a bit.
It is suggested that by quickly retrieving past work, Recall can help improve productivity by saving time that would otherwise be spent searching for misplaced content. Also, Recall will have a simple and intuitive interface with a search box and timeline view for browsing past snapshots. With OCR (Optical Character Recognition) you may search for a specific word or phrase that was on the screen at the time the “picture” was taken. The simple language model will permit you to phrase questions in normal English.
Since the screenshots will be saved locally on your computer, you can search for items even when you are not connected to the internet. So, they are at your disposal at all times.
When Microsoft first announced Recall they stated that it would automatically be turned on when you started your computer and if you did not like it, you could turn it off. But do to protests about privacy, that has now been reversed, and you will have to turn it on to make it work for you.
Hmm, but it also gives some cause for concern if you are not fully trusting of Microsoft security, they say they will not see your contributions to Recall. This does give me some concern, say if I do a bank transaction on my computer. Could some nefarious person at Microsoft get my username and password to get my money? So, there are potential drawbacks along with the benefits which you may want to consider.
What if a criminally minded person gains access to your device, they could access your entire digital history through Recall. This data being accessible would make your private information a potential target for hackers, increasing security risks to you.
Screenshots, basically being photos, have rather large file sizes. So, Recall needs a large amount of storage space allocated on your hard drive for saving them. It has been stated that you will need an SSD with at least 150 GB storage on a 1 TB SSD, to store the constant stream of screenshot data. You will need to consider purchasing a new computer if you want to use Recall. As I said earlier, Recall is currently exclusive to new Copilot+ PCs with specific hardware requirements. A computer will have to have a Neural Processing Unit (NPU) and at least 16 GB RAM. At the current time, that limits its availability. Also, currently Recall can only find content from the snapshots it has captured, so it won’t locate data that you have not opened or interacted with recently. So, does that mean you can get recent data that has been collected in the last few minutes, hours, days, etc.? I have no idea as of this writing.
While Recall offers productivity benefits, its privacy and security implications, as well as hardware and storage requirements, are significant drawbacks. You should carefully consider all of this before enabling the feature.
Microsoft has recently changed its stance on the release of the Recall feature after facing widespread criticism and backlash from security experts and privacy advocates. Now you will need more to use it. You will need to opt in purposely to use it, biometric authentication will be required to use Recall. Microsoft will mandate users to authenticate with Windows Hello (fingerprint, facial recognition etc.) before they can turn on Recall or access its data. Everything will be encrypted for access and you may exclude specific apps from being captured. This customization will prevent sensitive apps like communication tools or work apps from being included in the screenshot recordings. This all adds extra layers of security.
