Dive Brief:

• Microsoft is reportedly preparing Windows 7 and Windows 8.1 PCs for a more aggressive Windows 10 upgrade strategy.
• The company plans to kick off the new push soon, CIO reported.
• The company may force machines that have not voluntarily moved to Windows 10 to upgrade sometime in 2016.

Dive Insight:

Josh Mayfield, who created GWX Control Panel, said the tool was originally designed to make the "Get Windows 10" applet go away after Microsoft installed it in March. But Mayfield said the company is now working on a new version of GWX Control Panel, which added background monitoring.

"This is new behavior, and it does leave your PC vulnerable to unwanted Windows 10 upgrade behavior," he said.

Mayfield said he began hearing from users that their PCs were being switched from a "do-not-upgrade-to-Windows-10" status to a "do-upgrade" state.

"Microsoft has released this update several times," said Mayfield. "It doesn't change the name of the update, but every version is new, with new binary files."

The new push will consist of two steps. First, Microsoft will add the Windows 10 upgrade to the Windows Update list on Windows 7 and 8.1 systems as an "optional" item so users can still choose to update or not. But sometime next year, Microsoft will shift the Windows 10 upgrade from optional to "recommended.” Updates on that list are normally automatically downloaded and installed on PCs.