Beamer wrote on Jul 6, 2011, 16:45:
Steam's been open about hardware IDs since May. Even if you were unaware before it's impossible to be unaware now - every time you use a device with a new hardware ID it makes you authorize it via a code emailed to you.
Except when their system is under stress like during a sale now. Its been 3 or so days, still never got the email when I tried to login to my laptop.
CJ_Parker wrote on Jul 6, 2011, 17:08:
NoBS wrote on Jul 6, 2011, 16:56:
I thought if you opted out of Steam's hardware/software spyware survey, your information was not tracked and stored.
I'm pretty sure what Beamer described has to do with SteamGuard which is indeed optional and allows you to bind your Steam account to certain physical machines, thus making it harder for haXX0rs to hack into Steam accounts.
No one can opt out of Steam's spyware survey as far as I know. Steam survey is an integral feature of Steam that can not be turned off.
He is indeed talking about steamguard. Which is enabled by DEFAULT now. You MUST opt out of it if you don't want to use it. Goto "SETTINGS" then you will see a section that says "Security Status: Protected by steamguard". You can disable it if you like. All it does, is if a new computer tries to login to your account, it sends an access code to your email account and you use that code to enable the new computer. Its to prevent hacking. I personally like the idea.... if they would ever actually send the emails when the servers are under load.
As for Steam Hardware survey, last I checked it asked you when it was doing a survey if you wanted to do it. Maybe this has changed, but thats what I recall.
Edit:
Yeah here, it says optional
http://store.steampowered.com/hwsurveyIt probably remembers your previous answer about if it could do the survey or not, so you haven't seen the popup in a while. I've seen it a few times not too long ago since I've done some computer upgrades/reinstalls etc.
Edit 2: A google search reveals a steam forum mod saying not everyone gets the survey, its always something that prompts to see if you want to do it, and it often hits if you have new hardware.
This comment was edited on Jul 6, 2011, 20:01.