In the past there's been alot of debate about whether Media Player was spyware or not. By the very definition this IS spyware! Alot of software companies try to gather information about their users, but MS is the one company most people REALLY don't want gathering information on them. A lot of people completely overlook how much Media Player connects to the web for various things. You cannot possibly wear that tin foil hat with pride if you're actually allowing anything to contact MS!

If I were you I would completely uninstall WMP and use something like Media Player Classic. If you still refuse to ditch WMP then I guess I'll just have to show you how to make it as secure as I know how..... If you guys know of anything else that should be added then please leave some feedback in the forum thread about this article and we'll try to get it included as soon as we investigate it.

There's two routes to changing these settings. The easiest is through the programs settings.

Open Media Player --> Tools --> Options

 

 

 

Starting the Player in Media Guide mode connects to Microsoft's site to grab some news information. Some of the more paranoid people out there will want to uncheck this. I personally like it cause it gives me a quick place to watch the latest movie previews. Everything above explains itself well enough not to bother with commentary. If you guys actually want commentary on this let me know in the feedback thread and I'll update the article.

[HKEY_USERS\INSERT USER ID STRING\Software\Microsoft\MediaPlayer\Preferences]
"UsageTracking"=dword:00000000
They basically claim that tracking your usage helps them make the product better, but I REALLY don't like MS knowing things like what I'm watching.... What am I watching you ask? I'm not tellin......

"SilentAcquisition"=hex:00
This is the option to acquire license for content automatically. If you watch alot of things that frequently ask you to acquire a license to view it then I suggest using a different program for watching it.....

"PlayerScriptCommandsEnabled"=dword:00000000
Allows scripts to be executed. This can lead to a number of security exploits! This is frequently used in porn and the result is a popup caused by the video which triggers often times a LOT of other popups and it really can get nasty fast...

"UpgradeCodecPrompt"=hex:00
I personally stay fairly up to date on my codecs and I hope that you do too! Doom9.org and the Gordian Knot codec pack is what I use and it meets my needs quite well.

"AutoAddMusicToLibrary"=dword:00000000
This will help prevent anything from entering your media library without you telling it to be added....

This next one I'm still looking for more information on. I found it being used by Antispy Complete. This program sets this:
"MetadataRetrieval"=dword:00000000

The closest thing that i could find from a more reputable source is this:
"PreventCDDVDMetadataRetrieval"=dword:00000000

"SendUserGUID"=hex:00
globally unique identifier (GUID) when communicating with a remote media source
"DisableMRU"=dword:00000001
Saves File and URL history in player

I personally use winamp 5, and have uninstalled Media Player 9 to help prevent this ever so sneaky MS spyware. Most of us don't want any software contacting MS for anything at all.

An additional suggestion is to get this sucker out of your prefetch if you believe you need to use it! I've written an article about prefetching applications here. You'll want to look high and low and find every shortcut to Media Player and take the prefetch command out! There should be one in the quick launch, and under start --> Programs and another somewhere under start --> programs --> accessories.