No group policy that prohibit them is in place
I assume noone set any local policies either then =] Just asking, cuz I remember around the time MS switched from Windows Update to MS update, there was software/one or two updates distributed by them that actually tampered with those settings... Also, I've seen programs that grey out Windows Firewall settings, so it's probably possible that programs could do the same for automatic updates. But it's probably a MS thing...