[Bryant]

Microsoft spokesperson said:

We are hearing some reports from around the Web regarding machines that are re-starting and having automatic updating settings set back to
"Install Updates Automatically," despite having selected to be notified before installation of updates.

We are still investigating what caused this matter. As such, we encourage customers to contact support using the options discussed at
support.microsoft.com/security so that we can potentially gather more information.

[Prince]

I don't think this is affecting SP1 users ?

[Adam Maras]

I'm on RTM (not SP1) and I wasn't affected.

[lsdmeasap]

I also was not affected on RTM

[Bryant]

AlphaAlien, on Oct 11 2007, 12:31 PM, said:

Bryant, on Oct 10 2007, 10:59 PM, said:

Astyanax, on Oct 10 2007, 05:41 PM, said:

Aeden, on Oct 10 2007, 05:16 PM, said:

Ouch =\. I gather they aren't doing this for Server '03, though, right? You'd think they'd place the security of consumers on the same level as servers...which would then render a defense of "We're trying to protect our userbase, and if that means auto-updating without their consent, we're going to f**ing do it!" null and incorrect...never mind the other considerations.

Actually they are, I had told my father about this and he actually had this problem with his server at work. He was telling me he logged on the other day and had a notice that new updates had been installed even though he has it set not to do that. After checking the settings he noticed it had reset itself to auto download.
Not exactly wise for the situation he's in. He manages the Citrix operations for Blue Cross and auto updating could easily mess a number of things up.

I'm pretty sure he has a WSUS server running on the Blue Cross corporate network. If there is a WSUS server running on their network and the server still took a forced update, this problem just got much stickier.

it happens with WSUS too except after the reboot WSUS policy makes the settings revert to your WSUS settings. It's happened once or twice in the last year at my work

Can you confirm this?

[kHaN]

hi there! just registered to tell you what i have experienced after visiting the windowsupdate.com site on wednesday 02:45a.m. cest

i installed all updates and checked "reboot later"... after 10min. or so i left my room for a while.
when i came back i saw xp rebooting and was really pissed off (some data was still open and not saved...)
checking my eventlog after this was kind of scary:

date: 10.10.2007
time:03:05:10

eventlog_german said:

Der Prozess winlogon.exe hat den Neustart von xxx aus folgenden Gründen initialisiert: Es wurde kein Titel für den Grund gefunden.
Nebensächlicher Grund: 0x2
Herunterfahrungstyp: Neustart
Kommentar:

eventlog_translated_by_me said:

The process winlogon.exe initialized the restart of xxx for the following reasons: No title for the reason was found.
Unimportant reason: 0x2
Restarttype: Reboot
Comment:

here is a screenshot:

in addition i discovered another funny issue after reading through this post:
automatic updates were sure not checked on my machine...

regards kHaN

[mufunyo]

Shadow D. Wolf, on Oct 12 2007, 01:45 AM, said:

Oddly enough, my Vista box DIDN'T auto-update (I've always had it set to download, but let me choose to install).

But, upon seeing this thread, I checked the settings and, sure enough, Windows Update set itself to download, install, and reboot automatically. I guess it just hadn't gotten around to doing it yet. o.O

My Vista Ultimate did neither. It's still set to "Download updates but let me choose whether to install them". BUT I haven't updated for quite a while now, so it could be you need a recent update applied to have this happen to you. Updates I don't have installed yet (but are on the list):

KB939653
KB941202
KB933729
KB890830
KB941833
KB905866
KB941651
KB915597

I'm guessing one of these is the culprit that makes this behaviour happen, because I don't have these installed and it didn't happen to me. Any ideas which one it might be?

[peacho]

kHaN, on Oct 12 2007, 05:57 PM, said:

hi there! just registered to tell you what i have experienced after visiting the windowsupdate.com site on wednesday 02:45a.m. cest

i installed all updates and checked "reboot later"... after 10min. or so i left my room for a while.
when i came back i saw xp rebooting and was really pissed off (some data was still open and not saved...)
checking my eventlog after this was kind of scary:

date: 10.10.2007
time:03:05:10

eventlog_german said:

Der Prozess winlogon.exe hat den Neustart von xxx aus folgenden Gründen initialisiert: Es wurde kein Titel für den Grund gefunden.
Nebensächlicher Grund: 0x2
Herunterfahrungstyp: Neustart
Kommentar:

eventlog_translated_by_me said:

The process winlogon.exe initialized the restart of xxx for the following reasons: No title for the reason was found.
Unimportant reason: 0x2
Restarttype: Reboot
Comment:

here is a screenshot:

in addition i discovered another funny issue after reading through this post:
automatic updates were sure not checked on my machine...

regards kHaN

kHaN, the second reason is obviously what appears to be happening here, but the first is most likely some other silly behavior of Windows Update (at least on XP). I usually use the Turn off and Install Updates option to install updates, but if I need my machine shut down in a hurry and don't want to waste my time I click "Turn off Without Installing Updates". Unfortunately, the next time I reboot, it pretty much immediately installs them and then wants to reboot my machine. At that point I click "Reboot Later". However, usually I end up walking away for a while and don't realize it will come up "Your system will reboot in 10:00" and then does it, causing me to lose all work I had open at the time.

[BlueScreenOfDeath]

(trying to understand why patches that fix things...suddenly are bad) its a reboot for god sakes.

In other breaking news...

A rice bag fell over in China...more as it develops...

[steve-]

BlueScreenOfDeath, on Oct 12 2007, 11:33 PM, said:

(trying to understand why patches that fix things...suddenly are bad) its a reboot for god sakes.

In other breaking news...

A rice bag fell over in China...more as it develops...

Patches that are unauthorized and reboots that arent done with the Users consent? Well I could see how you'd come to that assumption!

[Edootjuh]

think about users losing their data and systems that shouldn't reboot, like servers...

[peacho]

Edootjuh, on Oct 13 2007, 03:32 AM, said:

think about users losing their data and systems that shouldn't reboot, like servers...

Exactly. Rice bags falling over don't cause people to lose data, and therefore productivity; rebooting computers when users have specifically stated they want to be in control of installing updates could.

[steve-]

peacho, on Oct 13 2007, 10:53 AM, said:

Edootjuh, on Oct 13 2007, 03:32 AM, said:

think about users losing their data and systems that shouldn't reboot, like servers...

Exactly. Rice bags falling over don't cause people to lose data, and therefore productivity; rebooting computers when users have specifically stated they want to be in control of installing updates could.

As said above someone with WSUS prevented the server from rebooting....... luckily...

[Daniel Smith]

Quote

A quick note regarding automatic update settings getting changed...



We have been hearing some questions recently regarding Tuesday’s update release changing automatic updating settings. We have received some logs from customers, and have so far been able to determine that their AU settings were not changed by any changes to the AU client itself and also not changed by any updates installed by AU.




We are still looking into this to see if another application is making this change during setup with user consent, or if this issue is related to something else. We are continuing the investigation, and as I have more information I will update this post.



If you are running into this issue, your help would be greatly appreciated. You can contact support, and they can walk you through the steps necessary to provide logs and other useful data.



Nate Clinton

Program Manger

Microsoft Update



This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.

http://blogs.technet...-web-posts.aspx

[Bryant]

Yep. We've also posted accordingly:
http://www.aeroxp.or...2_articleid=134