I've put it off for a year but now my Windows 10 installation is downloading 11 seemingly without any way to stop it. There's apparently a way to stop updates by editing the registry but I don't have the WindowsUpdate folder there for some reason.
I also looked into extended security updates for Win 10 but enrolling apparently costs 25 euros. No thanks. I know there are versions of Windows that have security updates until 2032 but I'm pretty sure I'd need to reinstall Windows to make use of those, and if I were willing to redo this installation I'd just go with Linux instead. (Coincidentally, I installed Linux on a small SSD last year and I've been spending a lot of time on it lately instead of Win10. If SSD prices weren't completely fucked I'd get a new big one and make it my main/gaming OS)
I assume I will need to make some kind of decision about this at some point since it's not like Win10 is getting any more secure. Going through with the Win11 "upgrade" is probably the path of least resistance. I'd appreciate any tips to disable forced telemetry, AI features, OneDrive integration and any other anti-features this update is likely to foist on me. Also is it going to fuck with my dual boot? As far as I know my Linux SSD should be completely invisible to Windows but I don't trust Microsoft to not do something sneaky and invasive.
EDIT: I got my Win10 ESU updates sorted out with massgrave scripts! Windows 11 averted
If you're using full disk encryption in Linux, your Linux install should be safe from Windows reading it. Assuming there's no evil maid situation.
If you're not using full disk encryption, then Windows could read it.
In both situations it's possible (but unlikely) for Windows to damage the Linux install or the bootloader to prevent it from starting up. Just make sure you've got a good regular backup scheme.
Should I disconnect the Linux drive then? When I installed Linux I had my Windows drive completely taken out, then I moved the Linux drive on top of the boot list in the BIOS. I get a grub bootloader menu when I boot and I just pick which OS I want to boot into. AFAIK Windows has no idea it's even there though one time an update sneakily moved Windows back on top of the list which was easy to reverse.
The fact Windows pissed around with grub means having separate drives would be the safest option.
Windows didn't fuck with grub (as far as I know), the Windows drive just got shuffled to the top of the list in BIOS
Oh. Sorry for the misunderstanding then!
Physical disconnection is guaranteed safe but can be an annoyance to do regularly. Full disk encryption that requires a password on bootup and regular backups of important files should be fine.
True full disk encryption is not possible on the grand majority of computers and even for the few without extreme tinkering and modification. I would even argue calling it FDE is inherently misleading since the boot partition and kernel has to be unencrypted.
This is technically true which is why I mentioned evil maid attacks. But for most people who just want to prevent a normal Windows install from reading data from a normal Linux install, LUKS is good enough.