From This Month Windows 10 Is Going To Block Unwanted Applications
Introduction
Windows Defender of Microsoft has made several enhancements since the launching of Windows 10 in 2015. With the previous version of Windows 10 (2004), it added a new setting, which was optional.
The setting makes the potential wanted apps block easily within the operating system. For those who are unaware of potentially unwanted apps, they are not malware but can cause harm in other ways.
Apps of such kind usually incorporate adware and other unwanted programs that get attached to the apps that we download from the internet.
A Bit About Potentially Unwanted Apps
The potentially unwanted apps usually come with the primary app downloaded by the user and they do not always cause harm. As per the view of Microsoft, the following apps are considered Potentially Unwanted Applications:
- Adware
- Torrent
- Minors
- Bundling software
- Marketing software
- Apps with the poor reputation of the industry
Read more: Windows 11: Everything You Need to Know
What’s Going On?
Earlier Microsoft added a feature to the settings of Windows 10 that lets the user instantly block potentially unwanted applications with the help of Windows Defender SmartScreen.
The feature is not exclusive to the Edge browser and can be enabled for the complete operating system, permitting Microsoft to block unwanted apps.
- Though the above option for available for a long, recently Microsoft has announced that it’s going to start automatic enabling of the feature.
- The new change will be there on desktops running Windows 10 May 2020 update or newer.
- The company has announced that it will begin this new change in early August.
- The change is going to be the default one that will make it easy for the users to keep their system perform at its best.
- There is a new feature for those who are not familiar with unwanted apps that can prove to be harmful.
What’s More?
Microsoft is hoping that people are going to stick to the automatic PUA blocking after it is disabled. However, there are chances that Windows 10’s security feature will flag legitimate apps as “unwanted”.
Thankfully, Microsoft will allow the users to perform this through settings:
- Click on the start menu and look for settings.
- Choose update & security.
- Select windows security.
- Use left sidebar options and navigate to App & Browser control tab.
- Now, search for “Reputation-based protection things”.
- Now, toggle the “Potentially unwanted app blocking” option for enabling or disabling.
The settings for blocking potential unwanted apps settings come with two options: apps block and downloads block. When you will select the first option, Windows will start detecting files/apps that are present on the device and block them.
On the contrary, the “block downloads” works only with Microsoft Edge.
Wrapping Up
As per some supporting documents, this new security policy can come into effect in early August, so it might be that this security feature has already started rolling out.
Besides this, Microsoft is also working on new security improvements for its Chromium-powered Edge browser. This is going to include Hello integration and HTTPS-only mode in Microsoft Edge.
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