A hacker’s arrest exposed a little-known way Microsoft can track users on a Windows PC, but VPN provider Windscribe says it developed a process to shut it down. Windscribe says its experimental computer script can remove the Global Device ID (GDID) from a Windows PC. Agents uncovered that an IP address associated with his hacks was linked to Stokes’s Windows PC through the 16-digit GDID. The complaint against Stokes notes that “A GDID remains consistent across Windows operating system updates on a device”; only a Windows OS reinstall creates a new GDID. There’s a downside, though; that path blocking can shut down account sign-ins for Microsoft services, including device sync, passkeys, and Windows Hello.