Constant network activity data being sent at 8-16 Kbps, what is it?!

dverdier said:

Delayed is fine as I used an email that doesn't go to my phone, I'm only just now seeing it. When I set up my pc I disabled as many automatic services as I could, and the store was on that list. I don't think that's what it is for me. I'm not sure when it changed but I'm now rec the 8k about every3-4 seconds instead of like a heartbeat. It may go double that time and then pop up with 16. I'm going to look for the tcp thing you used and see if I can figure it out. I still think it's strange you had send and I have receive.

Like I said, I experienced both of them. The send one that I experienced was some dos attack from Bolivia IP address from 4 years ago where even upon restart it would persist. When I enabled Windows Firewall then this stopped and then when I disabled it again it also stopped because it cut off the connection with that IP. I have since then never experienced the Send data again. I have decided to learn from my lessons and keep the firewall turned on. I have also made sure to use Ad Blockers like UBlock Origin when browsing the web as it helps guard against intrusions and malwares.

However, the issue with the receive data is definitely related to the Store app. Even if you disable the automatic download of the store apps from the settings, you must figure out what hardware is triggering it.

Is this a recent experience of yours? For example there's a Microsoft Store Install Service that's meant to be set to Manual. I detected that when I installed my DELL color printer upon every turn on it would trigger this service to start. When I installed the store app Dell Printer Hub and then uninstalled it this stopped the issue and printer is no longer triggering the Store Install Service. Bit stupid, but that's the design of Windows 10.

The other thing like I mentioned is the Store Experience Host. https://www.tenforums.com/attachment...ience-host.jpg
You have to uninstall that and test for yourself. You can of-course always reinstall it if it is needed.

If you see this network activity and then upon restart it disappears but after a few days, weeks it returns, either the Store Experience Host is triggering this behaviour or a recent hardware is looking for a store app. The Microsoft Store Install Service must remain unstarted. I also suggest you disable the Task Schedules related to the Store. But you shouldn't need to set this service to disabled because it really doesn't start on its own, unless something is triggering it.

Alternatively if you want your life to be easier you should consider getting Windows 10 LTSC where the Store app is stripped off from the system by default.

As I said I have not experienced this behaviour since the 8th of January. I also know that it was the Corsair K55 Pro XT in May causing this as but I returned the keyboard and went back to my old keyboard. It is looking for an app and that's what's triggering this bug.

I have not had any success with TCP for receive data. TCP only helped me 4 years ago finding the Bolivian IP address that was sending.

That all makes sense. I've recently been reintroduced to the task scheduler. I had totally forgotten about it. I del almost everything in there. I miss the old days where a computer did what you told it to do and you didn't need to be a computer scientist to turn on and off options. I've disabled everything that has anything to do with the store. I don't think that is it because the store use to be enabled back when the network would be flat. I have added a printer since then but I use it so little I keep all of that disabled too. Even the spooler. When I do need to print something, I just enable the spooler and hit print. It doesn't even need any of the other printer related services. It would be nice if you could open up more than one task man to see 2 tabs at one time. I think the 8k is so small that it doesn't reg on the processes tab tho. One think that does pop up a lot under network is signal rgb. It doesn't seem to match up with the 8k tho. I haven't yet but it'll be easy to rule out as it doesn't start auto. I need to just wait till everything settles after a startup and leave that off. It has to be some software I've added along the way I guess. Since it's incoming and not sending, it sounds like tcp won't help me there. Another thing I've done is go to msconfig and google every service that I don't already know and decide whether to disable it or not. I did that on my older pc with win 7 but 10 has like 5 times the amount of shit that runs. I've only made it a quarter of the way so far aside from obvious ones I knew off the top of my head or figured out from deduction., Since it has changed. I think it was multiple things doing it because it's no longer like a heartbeat. The amount of time between the 8s are usually double the previous time and sometimes 3-4x longer. I think I've gotten some of it. Hopefully when I take the time to finish that, the 8k will have stopped. Thank you for your insight and previous experiences.

Oh yeah. I've also found where they hid windows features and got rid of some of those.

The irony! My issue is back again! Yes, I was wrong. After almost 3 months today 31/07/2023 at this morning just turn on my PC at 12:25am this issue has returned. My last experience was on 5/05/2023. So pretty much almost 3 months on since that date this happened again.


The saddest part about this is that it gives zero clues what it is. If I paste Netstat -b as you can see Active Connections show nothing.

Netstat -ano will also show a list of IP address as Active Connections as listening.

The thing is, however, as long the computer is on the 8Kbps received data doesn't stop unless I restart the computer or turn off network activity and then turn it back on! Even if the PC remains on for several hours.

I will try experimenting with disabling Windows Update using group policy editor as my second experiment and see if this makes any difference.

So yes, this is extremely mysterious. Though, I'll admit just over 2 years ago before I reformatted Windows 10 I used Windows Update Blocker Tool and the issue was never occurring once in those 2 years!

This time I decided to test without using the Windows Update Blocker Tool. There is no Windows Update that I see in Event Viewer.

Also I use Target Specify 1903 How to Specify Target Feature Update Version in Windows 10 so it doesn't find new updates.

I will test by disabling Windows Update but with group policy editor this time as this will rule out any doubts on whether Windows Update is the culprit.

Surely, this cannot be telemetry as it is receiving data rather than sending... Also Microsoft Store Install Service remains unstarted, so that's not the case either.