If you’re using Google Chrome’s nifty tool to make it your default browser on Windows, you don’t even need to open the app settings on your PC. — We would like to inform you that Microsoft’s latest update introduced a nasty bug that only seems to go away if you revert your defaults to Microsoft Edge.
April Windows update in question, KB5025221 (opens in new tab) according to Gizmodo, is causing more than a few problems for enterprise users. (opens in new tab) .
Since July 2022, Google Chrome has included the ability to change the default browser by simply clicking a button, usually found at the top of the window as well as in the browser’s settings menu.
However, since the April 2023 Windows Update, Windows enterprise customers have been particularly struggling as it has been reported that every time Chrome is opened, the Windows Default Apps settings page opens and users have to close the settings page. doing.
“After today’s Windows 10 and 11 Cumulative Update 2023-04, every time I open Chrome, it opens the Windows default app settings,” wrote a disgruntled user on the Microsoft support forums. (opens in new tab) “I’ve tried many ways to solve this, but nothing worked. This is happening on all 600 systems I’ve applied the update to.”
Another user on the r/sysadmin subreddit found that just clicking on the link shortcut caused the problem.
“If Chrome is set as your default browser, clicking the link shortcut will[l] In addition to opening links in Chrome, it also opens Windows settings for default apps,” wrote user azaaza0909. (opens in new tab) Not to mention, they also said:
Windows Update doesn’t give much specific details about what it fixes, other than saying “This update addresses a security issue in the Windows operating system.”
Not just for corporate users
(Image credit: Microsoft)
Enterprise users seem to be the hardest hit by this bug, but they’re not the only ones. Consumer versions of Windows 10 and Windows 11 also seem to be affected by his April update, but the impact is actually more annoying than frustrating.
For regular customers, this update seems to have disabled Google Chrome’s ability to set the default browser via the browser itself. I can see that it’s trying to go into Chrome’s settings and set the default browser intention It forces the default app settings to open, but doesn’t actually change anything.you will have to Move down the app list , choose chrome ,and click the button from above it says set as default .
After setting Google Chrome as the default browser, Microsoft Edge[設定]Tried the same from the menu. However, in Microsoft Edge,[既定のブラウザー]of the menu[既定に設定]Clicking the button actually reset the default browser to Edge.
So does this mean that Microsoft is beating its Web browser rivals? No way can you motivate a company with thousands of employees to do so, but the Default Browser-Gate problem is on Microsoft’s part. Not pure malice, I believe.
What is behind the bug?
Setting default apps in Windows involves a user flipping a few switches on their browsing journey, but behind the scenes there’s a record of which apps are the default apps. (opens in new tab) Files to open files with specific extensions (such as .html) are recorded in the OS’s registry file system.
This is not a mean practice, as messing with registry settings can wreak all sorts of havoc and render your Windows installation non-functional. Google, on the other hand, has to edit an OS registry file to set Chrome as his default web browsing app. Even if the program does this all the time when installing or uninstalling components, usually he’s not as easy as one button. Click outside the Windows Settings menu.
And while Google may have run out of that tool for months, this teeth It is a type of security threat that attracts the attention of software security experts.
Changing your default web browser from within the browser itself is unlikely to pose any threats, but good information and software security is proactive rather than reactive. As such, Microsoft may have decided that these types of registry modifiable actions should be kept within Microsoft’s own settings system. This is likely to be far more secure than future versions of Google Chrome.
This is probably because Microsoft stated in one of the few notes about the update that “This update addresses a compatibility issue. This issue is caused by using an unsupported registry.” It’s what I’m referring to when I’m writing.
Why can Edge deny registry changes to Google? teeth It’s a Microsoft product, so obviously it’s much more compatible and The Windows OS developers themselves understand and work together internally to provide a safe way for browsers to do things that normally require a higher level of privilege when attempted by third-party apps. You can create This certainly makes it easier to maintain security as Microsoft controls both actors in the exchange.
Can Microsoft also do little things and make their competitors’ products just a little bit harder to use and their own products much easier instead? It’s not like Microsoft got into (and lost!) a very high-profile antitrust battle with the U.S. government over this very issue of Microsoft prioritizing his web browser over its competitors at the system level. No, right?
Given Microsoft’s increasingly violent push to increase adoption of Edge (including increasingly ferocious attempts to force them to switch to Microsoft’s browser). (opens in new tab) ), at least the best you can say is that Microsoft isn’t going to go that route to necessarily make it easier for Google to win the latest browser war. Ultimately it might affect both column A and column B a little bit, but from a security perspective it’s at least more defensible.
