Although this month's Patch Tuesday was delayed, Microsoft released a few updates this weekteam, which target Office 2013 and 2016 with a total of 17 patches.
Most interestingly though, this week, the company also released two updates that it tends to promote repeatedly. Yes, you guessed it, the two updates add data collection capabilities telemetryς in Windows 7 and Windows 8.1.
Let's first look at the patch for Office.
Η Microsoft provided 5 with different updates for Office 2013, with special patches for OneDrive, Project, and Visio. For Office 2016, the company has released updates specifically for Access, OneDrive for Business, PowerPoint, Project, Publisher, and Visio applications. Overall, all the updates released by the company reached 12.
Apart from these Office updates, Microsoft is re-released KB2952664 and KB2976978 for Windows 7 and 8.1.
As InfoWorld's Woody Leonhard reports, these updates first appeared at a time when everyone was trying to block the Get Windows 10 (GWX) add-on application, although Microsoft reports that these updates are not related to this application with any way.
The official KB pages do show that both updates were re-released on March 7th, while the descriptions state that they are only being released to users who are part of Windows Consumer Experience Improvement Program.
“This update runs tests on Windows systems participating in the Windows Customer Experience Improvement Program. Diagnostics assess the compatibility status of the Windows ecosystem to help Microsoft ensure device application and compatibility for all Windows updates. There is no GWX or to feature upgrade operating system in this update,” the description says.
Regardless of what Micrsoft says if you are one of those who have decided not to upgrade your systems to avoid collecting company telemetry data, it is a good idea to avoid these updates.