jutty

Not so much what’s preventing, but how hard it is to get away with it.

Whatever closed-source software is doing on your system, there is no way to know to begin with, what it is that it is doing. You can only look at the outer effects it has, but you can’t examine it much. So even if a closed system is doing all sorts of things, as long as it’s stealthy enough, there would be no consequences at all.

This is the very opposite is what you get with FOSS, not to mention the difference on how software is developed, built, distributed and managed in unix systems compared to proprietary ones.

The PC itself as in hardware? Hardly… Your data is at risk. So ignoring updates for both Mint and Windows will put you at a more vulnerable position from a security standpoint.

If you are asking if not updating Windows will make your Mint system insecure, the answer is no. At least to me an exploit leveraging an unmounted Windows partition is unheard of. It will of course make your Windows system less secure for the 2% of the time you do use it. Another side effect of updating it is that it may break your dual booting.