Removing Defender Notifications

Question

Recently I have had a client that uses an application that interacts with the desktop of Windows Server 2016. The application crashes/hangs/times out whenever a notification pops-up for Windows Defender. The main pop-up is the "Microsoft Defender Summary....".

We have implemented the following GPOs to prevent these pop-ups, however they do not seem to be working despite GPResult showing they have been applied.

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GPO: Disable Defender Notifications
Folder Id: Software\Policies\Microsoft\Windows Defender\UX Configuration\Notification_Suppress
Value: 1, 0, 0, 0
State: Enabled

GPO: Disable Defender Notifications
Folder Id: Software\Policies\Microsoft\Windows Defender\Reporting\DisableEnhancedNotifications
Value: 1, 0, 0, 0
State: Enabled

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I am at a loss as to why this GPO does not seem to be taking effect. The user has also checked (using the service accounts that interact with the desktop) the settings within Settings > Update & Security > Windows Defender - "Enhanced notifications" - off, so it does appear the GPO has switched this off correctly.

Anyone had any experience with this particular issue that could point me in the right direction? Perhaps I am being daft and missed something here?

Thanks,

Andy

Answer 1

Hello

It seems like you have already taken the correct steps to disable the notifications. However, there are a few things you could check:

Group Policy Update: Ensure that the Group Policy has been updated on the client machine. You can force an update by running the gpupdate /force command in the command prompt.

Registry Check: Check the registry settings on the client machine to ensure that the Group Policy settings have been applied correctly. The settings should be reflected in the registry keys you mentioned.

User Permissions: Ensure that the user account has the necessary permissions to apply these Group Policy settings.

Conflict Resolution: There might be a conflict with another policy or local setting that is overriding your Group Policy setting.

Software Updates: Make sure that Windows and Microsoft Defender are up-to-date.