Windows 10: Windows Defender Reputation Based Protection, unable to enable Block Apps under Potentially...

So my school made me download an app recently which gave me the Potentially Unwanted App warning, but since i needed to use it i press enter, afterwards i check my windows defender and it says my block apps feature is turned off, i tried to turn it back on but it keeps turning itself off so idk why, right now doing a security scan, so my question now is should i be worried? i recently got a notification from a customenterpriseblock too, i entered windows defender and chose to delete customenterpriseblock

:)

 

Potentially unwanted apps will now be blocked by default in Windows

Source: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/...b-a17e0ab6289e

Enable or Disable Microsoft Defender PUA Protection in Windows 10

Turn On or Off Potentially Unwanted App Protection in Microsoft Edge

 

Enable or Disable Windows Defender PUA Protection in Windows 10  

Apparently yes....

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/win...nder-antivirus

 

Why AdWare protection , PUA ,and PUP protection are not enabled by default in windows defender ?

It isn't enabled because the PUA protection in Windows Defender wasn't designed with consumer users in mind, it was instead designed for businesses which require this for compliance or other high security reasons.

Block Potentially Unwanted Applications with Windows
Defender AV - Microsoft Docs

If you read the title above carefully, you'll notice that it states "Block Potentially Unwanted Applications". This is because the MS PUA protection provides no granular control over these like antimalware apps such as MBAM, instead it can only block them.

The reason for this is that it was designed for businesses which don't want any such PUA apps installed on their machines and can so be used to lock these down. This means that there's no way provided to allow that single coupon or advertising app that
some consumers might want, so the support issues this would create for Microsoft with consumers aren't worth their time, thus it's not easily possible for consumers to enable PUA protection.

Remember that any program that is truly acting as malware is already treated by Windows Defender as such, while as Microsoft clearly states about PUAs in their article:

"These applications are not considered viruses, malware, or other types of threats, but might perform actions on endpoints that adversely affect their performance or use. PUA can also refer to applications that are considered to have a poor reputation."

So Microsoft doesn't make it easy for consumers to enable PUA protection, since they never intended it to be used by them in the first place.

In fact, in the years since 2005/6 that I've been using the Microsoft security products, I've had only a single item identified by Malwarebytes Antimalware as a PUP and this was actually an add-on included by Dell on a laptop that wasn't really of any concern
at all. Typically the only people whom ever receive PUPs are those who either install 3rd-party (usually free) programs or use their computers in risky ways, a careful person will almost never experience one of these during years of computer use.

Rob