Microsoft is quietly updating the controversial Windows 11 Recall feature, but not with the changes that are really needed
Microsoft’s flagship AI feature for Copilot+ PCs, Recall, has had its share of problems lately and is at risk of sounding like a hater – rightly so.
In case you missed it, Recall takes screenshots every few seconds, building a library of images that you can search through AI, but the feature has some serious privacy issuesto the point that Recall’s launch was pulled and relegated back to the Windows Insider program for further testing.
However, that hasn’t stopped Microsoft from quietly adding new features to Recall while the tech giant does damage control around this whole controversy.
As discovered by the well-known ‘leacker’ Albacore, who writes for Tom’s hardware (through New), there are a few new bits of functionality hidden in the latest Windows 11 preview build (in the Canary channel).
One of these is ‘screenray’, a utility that appears to analyze what is currently on the screen. It is invoked via a keyboard shortcut and allows the user to get additional information from Copilot about anything present on the screen, or access a translation of something in a foreign language.
While we have a limited understanding of the exact nature of this new tool, it looks a lot like the Reader feature in Safari that Apple introduced at WWDC – which uses Apple Intelligence to scan and translate a web page, together to grasp or provide insight into anything. Contents are currently being browsed. Of course, Windows 11’s Recall tool is available on your entire system, not just in a browser.
Additionally, Microsoft has implemented a revamped homepage design for Windows 11’s Recall feature. This means that when you launch Recall, instead of being shown a new snapshot, you’ll be presented with a grid of recent snapshots (there’s still a button which allows you to create a new snapshot – this just no longer happens by default).
Also new is a ‘Topic’ section that organizes snapshots by theme, so you can group related screenshots (for Spotify, for example) to make searching easier.
Finally, Windows Recall also has better integration with Copilot in this new preview build. Clicking on a snapshot reveals a drop-down menu with context-sensitive choices, so you can tell Copilot to copy something, open it in an app, or, if it’s an image, find images in the same vein or create a similar image. Essentially all standard Copilot options.
While these new additions to the controversial feature seem useful, I find it hard to get past how bizarre the whole feature feels in the first place. I’m sure I won’t be the only one either, and with all the concerns that have been raised about Recall lately, Microsoft still has a lot of work to do. It’s certainly going to take a lot more to get me on board than a homepage redesign and this new screenray functionality.
For now, Windows Recall lives in the Windows Insider program, where it will most likely be tinkered with and tested for quite some time before Microsoft dares to launch it again. Whatever happens, when the feature comes out, Microsoft needs to make sure it gets it right this time, and that means privacy and security need to be an absolute priority.