You Need To Move To Linux Today - WAN Show July 17, 2026

**Linus Sebastian** (0:00)
Introducing Meta Glasses. You have questions, they've got answers.

**Luke Lafrenière** (0:05)
Hey Meta, what's the capital of Peru? Lima.

**Linus Sebastian** (0:09)
How do you say, where's the restroom in Spanish?

**Dan** (0:12)
Dónde está el baño?

**Linus Sebastian** (0:14)
Hey Meta, is a hot dog a sandwich?

**Luke Lafrenière** (0:17)
Technically no, spiritually, yes.

**Linus Sebastian** (0:20)
Hey Meta, what should I do with my life? That's one of life's biggest questions. What do you think? Ask anything with the new Meta Glasses. On happy Friday, it's Friday.
Welcome to The WAN Show. We've got a great show lined up for you guys today. Microsoft admits that every Windows 11 install has a secret unique ID for tracking. Not only that, but they use it, and so does law enforcement. It might be time to switch to Linux, like now, like today.
Like, go start your download and then let it come down while you watch the rest of the show. We'll also be talking about the class action that's hitting YouTube over advertising around YouTube premium. They are alleging that Google advertises it as having no interruptions, and yet, right now, here on The WAN Show, right now, you could have premium and hear me tell you about our high-quality true spec cables available now at lttstore.com. That's right, we've got almost all lengths and connector ends in stock, and there's not a darn thing that YouTube can do to prevent me from telling you about it. What else we got going on this week, Mr. Lafreniere?

**Luke Lafrenière** (1:42)
We got a topic I'm really confused about.

**Linus Sebastian** (1:44)
You had the whole time that I was talking to find to. Did I pick yours again?

**Luke Lafrenière** (1:49)
Yeah, one of them.
Proton 11 is here. That's exciting considering we're talking about how you might want to switch over. That's a pretty important thing for a lot of people in this audience.

**Linus Sebastian** (2:00)
A lot of gamers.

**Luke Lafrenière** (2:00)
And 75 percent of all PlayStation 3 games are now playable on PC.

**Linus Sebastian** (2:08)
That's a pretty big deal in the emulation space.

**Luke Lafrenière** (2:11)
Yeah.

**Linus Sebastian** (2:30)
The show is brought to you today by Vessi, OpManager Nexus, Cape and Wispr Flow, alongside our usual RappPartner dbrand, our laptop partner Razer, and our chair partner also Razer. Let's jump right into our headline topic, which is of course, Microsoft admitting to the existence of a secret global device identifier, or GDID, that was revealed after US prosecutors unsealed a federal complaint regarding alleged hacker Peter Stokes, who was wanted in connection with the 2025 breach of a US luxury jewelry retailer. According to the complaint, Microsoft provided the FBI with a way to trace Stokes' Windows PC across VPNs and proxy servers through three countries.
This is f***ing crazy. Seriously, guys, I'm not being all hyperbolic here. I'm not being all like conspiracy theory, where's my tinfoil hat, keep the radio waves out of my brain. This is a serious problem. A Microsoft representative explained GDID in the complaint as, this is a quote, a persistent device level identifier that is designed to uniquely identify an installation of Windows operating system on a device, either a physical device, e.g. mobile phone or laptop, or virtual machine across certain Microsoft services and scenarios. End of quote. According to the story posted by Windows Latest, Microsoft uses it to manage software licensing and Windows Store apps. But because it links all your online activities on that computer back to one single identity, law enforcement can use it to track a device's true owner across the Internet.
Now, re-installing Windows does generate a new global device identifier, so it doesn't stay with you forever. But because all of this is being fed back to Microsoft, the second that you sign in to another account that you were signed into on the old machine, it's linked, and they would be able to resolve both of those GDIs to one individual person.

**Luke Lafrenière** (5:11)
Is this like a huge GDPR problem?

**Linus Sebastian** (5:14)
I'm not sure. Hold on.

**Luke Lafrenière** (5:15)
It feels like it.

**Linus Sebastian** (5:16)
Not quite done yet. The story states that when investigators hit a dead end, tracing IPs to VPN providers, Microsoft themselves provided the FBI with records showing what Stokes' device was doing. The Windows latest story has some suggestions on how you might maintain your privacy, and there's a full reverse engineering analysis from GitHub user. Sometimes wonder if you really want to get into the weed. So Dan, if you could throw that link into the chat for all the wonderful folks who are watching today. And now it's time for us to discuss. Like, look, I am not a ne'er do well. In general, I have taken a pretty loose approach to the trackability of my devices. I'm a public figure. I mean, it just kind of comes with the territory.