Enable Adware or PUA Protection in Microsoft Security Essentials

If you are a user of the Microsoft Security Essentials anti-virus software, you can make your operating system more protected. It is possible to enable Adware or potentially unwanted software protection in Microsoft Security Essentials with a Registry tweak.

Microsoft Security Essentials is widely used by Windows 7 users. In Windows 8 and later, the built-in “Windows Defender” app is similar to Microsoft Security Essentials and includes all its features. For Windows Defender, you can enable Adware or potentially unwanted software protection with a PowerShell command.

This method does not work in Windows 7 with Microsoft Security Essentials installed.

Instead, you need to apply a Registry tweak.

Enable Adware or PUA Protection in Microsoft Security Essentials

  1. Press the Win+R keys to open Run.
  2. Type “regedit” without quotes and press Enter to open the Registry Editor app.
  3. Navigate to the following key path:
    HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\
  4. Create here a new subkey “Microsoft Antimalware”.microsoft-antimalware
  5. Create a DWORD value named PUAProtection and set its data to 1.puaprotection
  6. Reboot your computer.

Microsoft Security Essentials will start blocking potentially unwanted apps.

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Author: The MFTNEXT Team

The MSFTNEXT project is a small team of authors who love to engage with the latest technology and gadgets. Being passionate Windows bloggers, we are happy to help others fix their system issues.

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