News, Reviews & Betas which includes large community peer support This was an extremely busy week in the Microsoft-verse with news items spread across multiple domains including sanctions on Russia, a surprising loss for Defender, and a bunch of web enhancements.
It’s the end of yet another busy week which means that it’s time to recap everything that went on in the world of Microsoft in the past few days. There’s lots to unpack this time including some restrictions on Russia, a surprising shun for Defender, and some welcome enhancements on the web. Join us in our weekly digest for February 26 — March 4! With tensions between Russia and most other countries mounting to a peak these past few days following its invasion of Ukraine, Microsoft decided to announce some sanctions on Russia, following guidance received from the U.S. and Europe. Apps from Russian state-sponsored media outlets Russia Today (RT) and Sputnik are no longer allowed in the Microsoft Store. Bing will not surface results from these websites either unless you explicitly name them in your search query, and they are banned from Microsoft’s ad network too. More importantly, all «new» sales of Microsoft products has been halted. The implication is that this includes new sales of Xbox hardware and service, Windows, Microsoft 365, and Azure. However, existing customers will continue to remain supported. This is just a part of the steps that many tech firms are taking against Russia and only time will tell how impactful they are. Microsoft’s Defender platform has quite a good reputation when it comes to protection against cybersecurity threats. Most recently, AV-TEST awarded it full marks in its tests conducted in October 2021 and December 2021. However, the same firm has shunned the consumer version of Defender in all of its awards for anti-virus solutions for the year of 2021. The «Best Protection» award was won by Bitdefender, Kaspersky, and Norton 360. Meanwhile, «Best Performance» was secured by ESET, G Data, PC Matic, Protected.net Total AV, Kaspersky, and Norton 360. Finally, Avira and ESET were crowned victors in terms of «Best Usability».
