Microsoft is finally launching a public preview of Recall, its flagship and somewhat controversial AI feature for Copilot+ PCs. The company planned to launch Recall in June, but privacy concerns and media backlash forced Microsoft to change the course and spend a few more months improving Recall before its public test. Now, it is time for Windows Insiders to try a public version of Recall and its new feature, Click to Do.
Windows Recall is currently available to insiders with Copilot+ PCs. To try the feature, you have to update your Snapdragon-powered computer to the just-released Windows 11 Dev build 26120.2415 preview. Once updated, Windows 11 will initialize the download of necessary components for Recall and Click To Do, another AI-powered feature Microsoft launched today.
To make sure all your data stays private and intact, Microsoft implemented several security measures and improvements. You will not be able to use Recall on non-Copilot+ PCs or without Windows Hello and Secure Boot. Recall will also ask you if you want to save snapshots of your work so that you can later retrace your steps back or search for something. You should also note that Recall will reserve a significant part of your system drive, which might become a problem on entry-level Copilot+ PCs.
Although Microsoft says that all snapshots remain local and never leave your system (Microsoft does not use them for AI training), some users will want to make sure Recall never captures certain apps or websites. You can specify those in the Settings app, and Microsoft even encourages users to share (anonymously) those apps and websites so it can improve Recall and its privacy protections. In addition, Microsoft promises that Recall won't capture passwords, credit card details, and other personal information.
Note that turning off Windows Hello or resetting your system will wipe all your snapshots for good. Microsoft will not be able to help you restore the data since it does not have access to it or keys for decryption. Speaking of which, Microsoft says a future update will make it possible to back up decryption keys.
As a Windows Insider, you should be prepared for changes in Recall that may delete your snapshots or force you to reset Recall. That is the nature of testing pre-release software on its road to the general public. Also, the current version has a few known bugs, which you can check out here.
Recall is currently available to Windows Insiders with Copilot+ PCs powered by Snapdragon X processors. It is coming soon to AMD and Intel-based Copilot+ PCs, but the exact date is unknown. Another important fact is that Recall currently only works with English, French, German, Japanese, Spanish, and Chinese languages.
Although Recall is turned off by default, Microsoft still allows uninstalling it. During the testing period, Recall's binaries will be cached on the system drive, but a future update will let users remove them completely.
3 Comments - Add comment