Windows defender Turned Off by "Group Policy" in WIN10 Home ed. !SOLVED!

[dinAZ]

I accepted the WIN10 upgrade and things have gone quite well until this week.  For no apparent reason, I have been receiving notices that Windows Defender has been turned off by group ploicy.  The notice tells me to contact my security administrator.

I am running WIN10 Home edition, and from what I can find out, it does not have a security administrator, and the only group I am aware of is my home Wi-Fi.  I am the owner of the desktop and the notebook, and am the "administrator" in both machines.  Granted, I am undertall for my weight, but I am not big enough to constitute a group.

Would anyone be able to suggest why I suddenly have this trouble?  Not knowing at all, but could it be some error in the resetting of permissions with the Tweaking free version?  I simply am not tech savvy enough to be able to figure this one out.  Any help or recommendations will be appreciated.

D in AZ

[Shane]

That means that there is a registry key in the policy section that is forcing it off.

Which should be at HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Policies\Microsoft\Windows Defender just delete that key and reboot, if that does the trick let me know and I will add that key to the policy cleanup in the windows repair

Shane

[dinAZ]

Shane:

At that registry location I found:
Windows / Windows Defender / Policy Manager
   Ab(Default)   REG_SZ    (value not set)
   DisableAntiSpyware   REG_DWORD   0x00000001 (1)

I deleted that entry and rebooted.  Went to the Update and Security tab to Windows Defender and found the page had been re-activated.  It had been grayed out.  I chose the Use Windows Defender command at the bottom of that page and it worked fine, confirming that Defender was up and running.

What a great fix from a fine mind.  I know I would never have found this on my own.  Thank you very much!  When this old teacher starts getting paychecks after school starts, be sure I will be subscribing to the Pro version.

Thanks again.  D in AZ

PROBLEM SOLVED

[Shane]

Awesome, I added it to the policy removal in the windows repair and will be in the next update

Shane