Group Policy Settings for Windows Defender

On Donna’s SecurityFlash blog she has a link to the Windows Defender group policy settings KB article that came out on November 1st.

To expand on her post a little I have extracted some of the settings and what they do, or don’t do, from the KB article, which you can find here.

These settings apply to XP and > when Windows Defender is installed.

The Windowsdefender.adm template contains settings for:

Turn off Windows Defender.

Turn off Real-Time Protection Prompts for Unknown Detection.

Check for New Signatures Before Scheduled Scans.

Download Entire Signature Set.

Enable Logging Known Good Detections.

Enable Logging Unknown Detections.

Configure Microsoft SpyNet Reporting.

Turn on definition updates through both WSUS and Windows.

The template is located in the install folder for Windows Defender, typically “C:\Program Files\Windows Defender”.

Anthony Clendenen

The Daily Ramblings of an SMS Engineer