This is not the first time I have seen this "Phone Home". In VMware Fusion, this is seen in the vmware-vmfusion.log which takes the form of
<timestamp> | VMware Fusion| I005: Phone Home: PhoneHome_CreateClient: Creating client for host https://vcsa.vmware.com/ph, collector <product>.<version>, instance <UUID>.
<timestamp> | VMware Fusion| I005: Phone Home: PhoneHome_CreateClient: Will send phone home requests to "https://vcsa.vmware.com/ph/api/hyper/send?_c=<product>.<version>&_i=<UUID>".
Something similar is in Workstation Pro on Linux vmware-ui-nnnn.log. I would think it is the same with Workstation/Player on Windows.
In the Preferences, the "Join the VMware Customer Experience Improve Program" is unchecked but these entries are still logged (I haven't verified if it actually sends something even if unchecked).
It is likely used for other things like checking for updated VMware Tools.
