Microsoft Defender Now Marks Windows 10 Telemetry Blocker as a Serious Security Risk

Microsoft Defender Now Marks Windows 10 Telemetry Blocker as a Serious Security Risk

Windows 10 diagnostic data, which Microsoft collects in encrypted form, is necessary to identify security problems, as well as analyze and fix various kinds of errors. However, users often block telemetry, considering the collection of diagnostic data to be Microsoft’s espionage. Now it became known that attempts to block telemetry servers using the hosts’ files are diagnosed by Microsoft Defender as a serious security threat.

Windows10

Network sources say that the company has made changes to the built-in Microsoft Defender antivirus used in Windows 10. Now it will warn of a serious security threat if an attempt to block telemetry servers through the host’s file is recorded. Recall that the host’s file contains a database of domain names and is used when translating them into network addresses of web sites.

If you try to edit the host’s file to block telemetry servers, then Windows Defender will not allow saving the changes and will display a corresponding warning “SettingsModifier: win32 / HostsFileHijack”. This is classified as a serious security risk, so the modified host’s file cannot be saved until the user rejects the antivirus message.

If you try to edit the hosts’ file to block telemetry servers, then Windows Defender will not allow saving the changes and will display a corresponding warning “SettingsModifier: win32 / HostsFileHijack”. This is classified as a serious security risk, so the modified hosts’ file cannot be saved until the user rejects the antivirus message.