Seeing as another major round of updates to Windows 10 is about to take place next week it only makes sense to see some fear-inducing articles. In fairness, the articles themselves aren't that bad (see PC World) as the content mostly explains away the so-called controversy. Nonetheless in the age of "I only read the headline" things like "You can't turn off Cortana in the Windows 10 Anniversary Update" with the fine print "...but you can lessen her awareness" does a disservice to the community. Normally, I ignore such articles as in June we wrote a detailed guide called "How to turn off Cortana and stop personal data gathering in Windows 10". That guide mostly applies to the current version of Cortana, but a lot of the privacy tips are relevant for the Windows 10 Anniversary Update. Best VPN providers 2020: Learn about ExpressVPN, NordVPN & more

Now, in fairness, Microsoft did change some things around. The criticism that an "off switch" for Cortana is removed is technically correct and likely where much of the misinformation originates. But there is a reason for this too, which is a change in the structure of Cortana and it being a service on iOS and Android.

Here are the facts: To use Cortana on Windows 10 and Mobile you need to link your Microsoft Account to the service. Cortana asks you this during a clean install, and it should also ask you during an upgrade too when you first go to use Cortana. Microsoft renamed Bing web and local PC search as "Cortana" too. So there is the non-personalized generic Cortana and the one that does the personal stuff e.g. location, reminders, email, flight tracking, etc. At any time you can also log off Cortana. You can also wipe your web, Cortana, search and device history With the Anniversary Update, anyone can use Cortana. Some of the benefits are still regionalized, but Microsoft is expanding the service and letting users choose regions so new users can opt-in. This is, after all, what people had asked for with feedback. Here is how to log off Cortana if you already are using the Anniversary Update. Logging out of Cortana in the Anniversary Update