The content on Microsoft’s MSDN and TechNet blog platforms will soon become read-only. Look for future blog posts about Microsoft’s security configuration baselines and the Security Compliance Toolkit on the new Microsoft Security Baselines Blog, along with a new Microsoft Security Baselines discussion space. We have also migrated our most important posts on this site to the new site….
Security baseline (FINAL) for Windows 10 v1903 and Windows Server v1903
Microsoft is pleased to announce the final release of the security configuration baseline settings for Windows 10 version 1903 (a.k.a., “19H1”), and for Windows Server version 1903. Download the content from the Microsoft Security Compliance Toolkit (click Download and select Windows 10 Version 1903 and Windows Server Version 1903 Security Baseline.zip). Note that Windows Server…
Security baseline (DRAFT) for Windows 10 v1903 and Windows Server v1903
Microsoft is pleased to announce the draft release of the security configuration baseline settings for Windows 10 version 1903 (a.k.a., “19H1”), and for Windows Server version 1903. Please evaluate these proposed baselines and send us your feedback via blog comments below. (Note: the final version of this baseline was published here.) As usual, the content…
Issue with SystemGuard Launch setting in Windows 10 v1809 and Windows Server 2019
[Update, 17 April 2019: Microsoft released a fix for this issue in the 2019-03 Cumulative Updates for Windows 10 Version 1809 and Windows Server 2019. See https://support.microsoft.com/kb/4490481 for more information.] Customers that deployed Microsoft’s security baseline for Windows 10 v1809 and Windows Server 2019 on systems with UEFI secure boot enabled might experience device boot…
Remote Use of Local Accounts: LAPS Changes Everything
Long overdue post revisiting the question about whether and when to block the use of local accounts, particularly for remote administration. Beginning in 2014 with our baselines for Windows 8.1 and Windows Server 2012R2, our security baselines have been blocking remote use of local accounts. Back then, Windows had yet to offer anything resembling…
Security baseline (FINAL) for Windows 10 v1809 and Windows Server 2019
Microsoft is pleased to announce the final release of the security configuration baseline settings for Windows 10 October 2018 Update (a.k.a., version 1809, “Redstone 5” or “RS5”), and for Windows Server 2019. Download the content from the Microsoft Security Compliance Toolkit (click Download and select Windows 10 Version 1809 and Windows Server 2019 Security Baseline.zip)….
Security baseline (DRAFT) for Windows 10 v1809 and Windows Server 2019
Microsoft is pleased to announce the draft release of the security configuration baseline settings for Windows 10 version 1809 (a.k.a., “Redstone 5” or “RS5”), and for Windows Server 2019. Please evaluate these proposed baselines and send us your feedback via blog comments below. (Note: the final version of this baseline was published here.) The downloadable…
Policy Analyzer – minor update
Policy Analyzer is a utility in the Security Compliance Toolkit for analyzing and comparing sets of Group Policy Objects (GPOs). We have just posted a minor update that resolves a localization bug reading some non-English advanced auditing settings files (audit.csv), and another bug that would cause Policy Analyzer to crash when reading an invalid GPO backup…
Security baseline for Windows 10 “April 2018 Update” (v1803) – FINAL
Microsoft is pleased to announce the final release of the security configuration baseline settings for Windows 10 “April 2018 Update,” also known as version 1803, “Redstone 4,” or RS4. Download the content from the Microsoft Security Compliance Toolkit (click Download and select Windows 10 Version 1803 Security Baseline.zip). The downloadable attachment to this blog post…
Security baseline for Windows 10 v1803 “Redstone 4” – DRAFT
Microsoft is pleased to announce the draft release of the security configuration baseline settings for the upcoming Windows 10 version 1803, codenamed “Redstone 4.” Please evaluate this proposed baseline and send us your feedback via blog comments below. (Note: the final version of this baseline was published here.) The downloadable attachment to this blog post…