Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Computing/2016 December 2

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December 2

Is a Windows computer ID (e.g. DESKTOP-S5VAG67) sensitive information?

Is a Windows computer ID (e.g. DESKTOP-S5VAG67) sensitive information? --129.215.4.242 (talk) 12:29, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

The computer ID is available to anyone monitoring the network and any server you communicate with. It is an identifier, but it is not sensitive any more than your personal name is sensitive. Like your personal name, other computers will use your computer's ID more than your computer will. 209.149.113.4 (talk) 15:58, 2 December 2016 (UTC)

Just as for a name, the answer to OP's question is "it depends". Yes, you can post it online and nothing terrible will happen to you. On the other hand, MAC addresses are also mere identifiers, but when this happens people complain about their privacy. Tigraan^{Click here to contact me} 14:21, 5 December 2016 (UTC)

I can't find information online about how default names like "DESKTOP-S5VAG67" are generated, but I'm 99% sure that the part after the hyphen is random, with no hidden information. It's there just to minimize the chance that different machines on the same network will have the same name. If you don't like the default, you can change it to anything else. (It's your responsibility then to make it unique: Windows won't append random characters to a name you choose.) -- BenRG (talk) 00:07, 6 December 2016 (UTC)