A Windows Update Bug Is Renaming Everyone's Printers To HP M101-M106 (xda-developers.com) 55
An anonymous reader quotes a report from XDA Developers: A few days ago, we spotted that the HP Smart App was being installed on people's PCs without their consent. Even worse, the app would reappear if users tried to uninstall it or clean-installed Windows. Now, the cause has finally been identified: a recent Windows 10 and 11 update is renaming everyone's printers to "HP LaserJet M101-M106" regardless of what model it actually is. As reported on Windows Latest, the latest update for Windows 10 and 11 seems to think that people's printers are an HP LaserJet model, regardless of their actual brand. It's believed that the bug appeared after HP pushed its latest metadata to Windows Update, but something went awry in the code and caused other printers to be labeled as HP LaserJet printers.
This explains why the HP Smart App has been sneaking onto people's computers without their consent. A key part of Windows Update is keeping third-party drivers and devices updated, including downloading any apps that the devices depend on. After the printer metadata incorrectly identified everyone's printers as HP LaserJet printers, Windows installed all the software needed for an HP printer to work smoothly, including the HP Smart App. Fortunately, the bug only affects the metadata for the printer. While the printer may show up with a different name on your system, you should still be able to send print jobs to it. Microsoft has since removed the fault metadata from Windows Update, so anyone performing a clean install from now on should get their original printer's name back and stop the HP Smart App from re-downloading. Further reading: HP Exec Says Quiet Part Out Loud When It Comes To Locking in Print Customers
This explains why the HP Smart App has been sneaking onto people's computers without their consent. A key part of Windows Update is keeping third-party drivers and devices updated, including downloading any apps that the devices depend on. After the printer metadata incorrectly identified everyone's printers as HP LaserJet printers, Windows installed all the software needed for an HP printer to work smoothly, including the HP Smart App. Fortunately, the bug only affects the metadata for the printer. While the printer may show up with a different name on your system, you should still be able to send print jobs to it. Microsoft has since removed the fault metadata from Windows Update, so anyone performing a clean install from now on should get their original printer's name back and stop the HP Smart App from re-downloading. Further reading: HP Exec Says Quiet Part Out Loud When It Comes To Locking in Print Customers
I gotta tell ya (Score:5, Funny)
This has really wreaked havoc with my DECwriter!
Re:I gotta tell ya (Score:5, Insightful)
No you mention it, why is the optional "HP Smart App" being installed, as opposed to just the basic printer driver?
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For asking such an inconvenient question, you are hereby sentenced to three HP InstantInk subscriptions.
Re:I gotta tell ya (Score:4, Funny)
I was greatly amused that it's an HP product that did this, because HP has always been a good brand for pranks.
In the Before Time, in the Long Ago, one April Fools I used HPLIP to change the idle message on the office printers, from "READY" to things like "INSERT COIN", "OUT OF CHEESE", etc. One in a friend's cubicle I made particularly insidious - I made it state just "READY" 90% of the time, but for the other 10% of the time, I had it scroll through the lyrics to "Mister Roboto", one line at a time, matching the song's rhythm. Knowing that by the time she noticed, and actually got someone else to look at it, it'd probably be back to saying "READY" and wouldn't change again while they were looking at it. ;)
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I think you are suppose to config the printers thru the app and not control panel.
Never works.
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Choices:
HP LaserJet Pro M102w/M104w and Ultra M106w Printer Full Feature Software and Drivers 44.11.2779 119.6 MB Feb 24, 2023
HP LaserJet Pro M102w/M104w and Ultra M106w Printer Basic Driver 44.11.2779 45.3 MB
Smart app?
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Windows will gladly auto install it for you. It does not matter if you are logged into the Store or not. Or if using a local or AD account. Ricoh printers do the same thing, just not until after the printer is installed. Samsung as well.
I never had problems like this (Score:2)
with my Okidata 120 printer.
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You think you have problems? Some guy named Gutenberg just called our tech support line.
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Re: I gotta tell ya (Score:1)
And people tell me I'm crazy (Score:3)
for thinking that vendors should be financially liable for bugs and vulnerabilities in their products....
Re:And people tell me I'm crazy (Score:5, Insightful)
You know what, I'd support that for all vendors that refuse to allow manual updates. That might be a good way to revert back to the days of sanity when people could pick and choose. A few well placed lawsuits when a non-optional update causes problems would be instrumental in taking us back to the good ole days.
I still can do my updates manually, but the amount of new pain I have to go through to kill auto-updates with each subsequent version of Windows is exceptional. Issues like this make it worth the pain in the long run, but God it makes me angry setting it up.
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the amount of new pain I have to go through to kill auto-updates with each subsequent version of Windows is exceptional.
Huh? You can just disable the Windows Update service. Then it can't scan for, download, or apply any updates. This has been true since Windows 2000 so I'm not sure what new pain you're experiencing.
Re:And people tell me I'm crazy (Score:5, Informative)
Huh? You can just disable the Windows Update service.
There are about ten other services that will automatically re-enable the Windows Update Service if you turn it off. It quite effectively self-heals. It will stay off for a little while, but then a day or two or maybe even a week later it will be on again. Even so, disabling all update capability is relatively easy. Less easy is disabling just the automatic part and retaining the ability to manually install updates you choose.
Good luck.
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Huh? You can just disable the Windows Update service.
There are about ten other services that will automatically re-enable the Windows Update Service if you turn it off. It quite effectively self-heals. It will stay off for a little while, but then a day or two or maybe even a week later it will be on again. Even so, disabling all update capability is relatively easy. Less easy is disabling just the automatic part and retaining the ability to manually install updates you choose.
Good luck.
If you disable it, not just stop it, no, nothing else (as of current Win11) starts it.
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the amount of new pain I have to go through to kill auto-updates with each subsequent version of Windows is exceptional.
Huh? You can just disable the Windows Update service. Then it can't scan for, download, or apply any updates. This has been true since Windows 2000 so I'm not sure what new pain you're experiencing.
While you can disable it, it turns back on at least once per month, no matter how thoroughly you try to gut it. I even got Windows Professional thinking it was supposed to allow more end-user control. Not so. No matter what I do to turn off all the update garbage, it auto-downloads updates and one day you will have no choice but to install updates at shutdown. You can install updates and shutdown or install updates and reboot. This started with Windows 10, and has only gotten far worse under Windows 11.
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yep - you can plan all sorts of whack a mole but it seems like eventually something turns it back on, unless its actually a member of domain getting group policy applied regularly.
About they only way I have found to reliably keep my Windows 11 VMs from updating, is to deny them internet access except for specific white listed destinations.
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And you here by get an apology letter for the heinous crime of having your printer renamed: Sorry dude.
Done. It took me longer to type this than you took to rename your printer. I think the punishment is fitting.
A Windows update zero day is inevitable (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:A Windows update zero day is inevitable (Score:5, Interesting)
The developers that control the Windows update servers must be shitting bricks over this incident, it is only a matter of time that a malware developer tricks Windows update into installing ransomware or a ddos utility which Windows will auto install on to the 1.5 billion Windows devices out there. It would be the ultimate failure of cybersecurity, and I'm surprised no one has successfully attempted it yet. I bet a Microsoft Edge update will deliver the payload.
If they're allowing third-party companies to shove through updates they haven't checked, which the last couple of HP wildcards have shown in probably true, any random driver update could deliver any payload in the world, and they'd never know until it was too late.
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Well, maybe they can coordinate with the guys that completely compromised Azure and o365 and blow that shitshow in Redmond up completely so we can finally be rid of their crap.
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I guarantee there was a meeting when it was first proposed to give 3rd parties access to the system where the devs raised holy hell about this, but some PHB had some bright idea...so here we are.
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I have plenty of bags of popcorn ready for the shit show that will ensue. It's not a matter of "if" but "when". As you pointed out Microsoft is sitting on a time bomb with their track record related to security.
Haha (Score:1)
Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha
I'm sorry, this is funny as shit. So glad I don't run Winblows anymore.
Hey, my grandfather was named HP M101-M106! (Score:2)
Don't overlook what both HP and Microsoft did. (Score:3)
"Windows installed all the software needed for an HP printer to work smoothly, including the HP Smart App..."
Regardless if Microsoft wrongly identified my printer as an HP printer or not, I want both organizations (HP and Microsoft) to PROVE to the user community that the HP Smart App is needed in order to drive an HP printer.
Had a Laserjet 1100 series printer for almost a decade. That basic B&W laser printer functioned flawlessly with no more than a basic driver. Forget Microsoft backing out of the problem now. The audience deserves an answer for that bullshit app push.
Re:Don't overlook what both HP and Microsoft did. (Score:5, Interesting)
Time to throw it on a Raspberry Pi and get CUPS running.
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Time to throw it on a Raspberry Pi and get CUPS running.
That's one hell of a Windows OS downgrade suggestion, but I like your style.
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The audience deserves an answer for that bullshit app push.
Slap the word "value added" on the app and call it a day. No computer with no OS on it has just the bare minimum functionality running. That hasn't been the case since we stopped programming our own software by typing BASIC prompts and saving them on a cassette.
Like why did DOS get shipped with a debug package? I'm no programmer! It's not functionality *I* wanted. How dare they! Why aren't more people talking about the heinous crime of shipping a utility virtually no one used with computers back in 1992!
Microsoft, always good for laughs (Score:2)
Still cannot get basic updates right after being in the business for almost 50 years. Must be some small software junk-shop you would think.
Something went awry.... (Score:2)
It's believed that the bug appeared after HP pushed its latest metadata to Windows Update, but something went awry in the code and caused other printers to be labeled as HP LaserJet printers.
No, it wasn't something going awry, it was HP trying to lock-in all those users who don't use HP equipment.
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This sounds like a coup. (Score:2)
Regex: a magical string but unpredictable outcomes (Score:1)
There are those with a college degree in creating regex strings but for the rest of us :
https://www.reddit.com/r/Progr... [reddit.com]
Well this explains things (Score:2)
A Windows Update Bug Is Renaming Everyone's Printers To HP M101-M106 ... the bug appeared after HP pushed its latest metadata to Windows Update, but something went awry in the code and caused other printers to be labeled as HP LaserJet printers.
I guess that "Further reading" note really hits the nail on the head:
HP Exec Says Quiet Part Out Loud When It Comes To Locking in Print Customers
HP is *super* serious about locking down print customers. :-)
In 25 words or less (Score:2)
Read your EULA closely, if you have trouble, I'll translate it using 25 words or less: "You have no rights, you'll eat my shit and like it".
Any software linked to a piece of hardware, (OS, drivers, pre-bundled applications) now suffers from online install, auto-update, no-rollback, and no update-disable behaviours. It's not homogeneity and consistency, it's enshitification of the user experience for the purpose of cost-cutting and dumber employees.
I remember the good old days of software upgrades (Score:2)
1990s-about 2010
When you didn't dare install new Windows Service Packs, drivers, Browsers updates until Friday night, just in case it trashed your system and you needed all weekend to sort things out including a fdisk/format/reinstall.
Still good practice today.
Smart? (Score:2)
...stop the HP Smart App from re-downloading
"HP" and "Smart" should never be used in the same sentence. Unless the sentence goes something like "It's Smart not to buy HP printers".
HP Smart is flagrantly wasteful of power (Score:1)
HP Smart has a horrible misfeature. It creates a task in Windows Tasks Scheduler that wakes the computer every day at the same time to check for a new version of HP Smart. This might be innocuous, except that the task is marked as "Wake the computer if necessary." So every computer with HP Smart installed runs for several minutes a day and then (hopefully) shuts down again.
You might think, "Who cares?" But the impact is significant.
1. For laptop users, the update check can easily drain your laptop's batter
Bet you a dollar (Score:1)