I did something today that will make certain corners of the internet audibly gasp.
I didn’t disable telemetry.
I didn’t firewall it.
I didn’t put on a tinfoil hat and boot into a Faraday cage.
No.
I installed every Ubuntu data-donation tool
and opted in manually
like a lunatic
with intent.
Yes. Telemetry.
On.
All of it.
Step 1: Installing the “evil” telemetry tool
First, I installed Ubuntu’s main data-donation package:
sudo apt update
sudo apt install ubuntu-report
Then I looked at the data it collects:
ubuntu-report
And what did I see?
- CPU model
- GPU model
- RAM size
- Screen resolution
Oh no.
My computer… exists.
Step 2: Opting in aggressively
Not satisfied with a passive existence, I explicitly told Ubuntu:
ubuntu-report -f send yes
That’s right.
Not “ask me later”.
Not “maybe”.
YES. SEND IT.
Somewhere, a Canonical server blinked awake like:
“Another one has chosen… participation.”
Step 3: Package usage stats (aka “He installed VLC”)
Next up: popularity-contest.
This reports which packages are installed, not how you use them.
sudo apt install popularity-contest
During install, it politely asks if you want to participate.
I clicked Yes like a villain pressing a red button.
To check it’s alive:
systemctl status popularity-contest
It runs about once a week and basically says:
“User has Firefox. Again.”
Step 4: Crash reporting (because software crashes, shockingly)
Then I enabled Apport, Ubuntu’s crash reporter:
sudo apt install apport
Edit the config:
sudo nano /etc/default/apport
Set:
enabled=1
Then:
sudo systemctl enable apport
sudo systemctl start apport
Now when something explodes, Ubuntu can go:
“Ah. That’s why.”
Instead of:
“Guess we’ll never know.”
Step 5: Confirm I went full chaos mode
To verify I installed everything:
dpkg -l | grep -E "ubuntu-report|popularity-contest|apport"
If all three show up, congratulations—you’ve joined me in telemetry enlightenment.
What Ubuntu actually receives (brace yourself)
- CPU: yes
- GPU: yes
- RAM: exists
- Installed packages: known
- Crash stack traces: occasionally
No:
- Browsing history
- Files
- Keystrokes
- Thoughts
- Dreams
- The thing you regret Googling at 3am
Meanwhile, Windows is out here like:
“We noticed you hovered over the Start menu for 2.4 seconds. Are you okay emotionally?”
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