Microsoft Edge is getting a major security boost straight out of Minority Report
Microsoft is looking to give its web browser a significant security upgrade with the release of a new build featuring some useful protection updates.
The company has revealed that Microsoft Edge v.98 will offer a boosted browsing experience that puts safety and security at the forefront, as well as “giving you an extra layer of protection when browsing the web.”
This will allow users to “enhance your security on the web”, the official entry in the Microsoft 365 roadmap says.
Step forward
There’s not a lot of detail about what the “new browsing experience” in Microsoft Edge v.98 will entail just yet, but the company says it will be “a step forward”.
It will allow administrators to apply group policies to end-user desktops across not just Windows devices, but also those running macOS and Linux.
These should help protect against so-called zero-day threats, which are brand-new malware threats that typically look to take advantage of recently-discovered security flaws, and are often extremely dangerous due to a lack of reference points.
Microsoft Edge v.98 will allow users to “mitigate unforeseen active zero days”, the company says, offering an extra layer of protection to keep them safe online.
It’s not clear if the new security protections form part of the long-awaited “super duper secure mode” for Microsoft Edge, which launched back in November 2021 as the company looked to boost security for the browser.
Available for Edge v.96 and upwards, the new platform offers two separate configurations – Balanced and Strict – which determine the level of additional protection the user receives.
Balanced mode learns which sites the user frequents and loosens restrictions on these domains, whereas Strict mode applies restrictions across all websites, which may mean some elements no longer work as intended. Users can also create exceptions manually for websites they would like to be exempt from the extra security measures.
