How do I PERMANENTLY disable News and Interests from the task bar?

I did all of that, and it did not work.

I have tried these steps and receive the following error message:
"Cannot edit ShellFeedsTaskbarViewMode: Error writing the value's new contents"

Hello Diane,

Thank you for reaching out to the Microsoft Community and I'll be glad to assist you today.

1. Right-click the News and Interests icon on the taskbar.
2. Expand the 'News and Interests' option, and click Turn off.

If the icon is enabled again, probably it could be a temporary glitch with the system. You could try restarting your Windows file explorer (or) Run a system scan to fix the corrupted system files.

1. Open task manager, find the Windows Explorer process in the lists and click restart.
2. Run a System file checker utility.

System File Checker is a utility in Windows that checks for problems with files on your computer. To run it, follow these steps:

https://support.microsoft.com/help/365e0031-36b...

In addition to these options, you can also permanently disable the News and Interests feature from the Local Group policy editor.

a. Click the Windows + R key, type gpedit.msc and click enter.

b. Expand the following folders:

Under computer configuration > Administrative Templates > Windows components > News and Interests.

In the right pane, select Enable news and interests on the taskbar policy and set it to "Disabled".

I hope this information helps. If you have any questions, please let me know and I will be happy to help you further.

Best regards,

Gunasekar N

Diane, I am sorry that you are still experiencing issues.

In this case, you could try disabling the News and Interests widget using the Registry and check if it helps.

1. Open Registry Editor.
2. Expand the following folders:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Feeds

3. On the right pane, you will have the registry called ShellFeedsTaskbarOpenOnHover REG_DWORD

Double-click the Data type and set the value data to 0.

If you cannot find ShellFeedsTaskbarOpenOnHover registry, create a new DWORD32 bit key and set the value data to 0.

4. Restart your computer.

Disclaimer: Generally, modifying registry subkeys or work group is intended for advanced users, administrators, and IT Professionals. It can help fix some problems, however, serious problems might occur if you modify the registry incorrectly. Therefore, make sure that you follow these steps carefully. For further protection, back up the registry before you modify it. Then, you can restore the registry if a problem occurs. For more information about how to back up and restore the registry, click How to back up and restore the registry in Windows - Microsoft Support to view the article.

 https://support.microsoft.com/help/855140ad-e318-2a13-2829-d428a2ab0692

I hope this information helps. If you have any questions, please let me know and I will be happy to help you further.

Best regards,

Gunasekar N

Diane, if you've followed all the suggestions and the News and Interests widget still keeps appearing, it could be due to a glitch or corrupted system files. Since you're not experiencing any other issues, repairing the entire system files might not be necessary and could cause other problems. In this case, it might be best to wait for an update that could resolve the temporary issue. However, if you want to remove the widget immediately, you can try an in-place upgrade, which will reinstall the system files without affecting your personal files or apps.

Let me know if you need more help.

Best regards,

Gunasekar N