Windows 10: Base Filter Engine and Windows Defender Firewall services stop working when German Language...

We have recently run into a problem with Windows 10 v21H2 whereby changing the Welcome screen and new user account international settings + system locale to German Germany stops the Base Filter Engine service and Windows Defender Firewall service from starting.Without these two services running, the OS is rendered useless for a network environment.Event veiwer is flooded with events about the failed service start but has no difinitive information or error code.Strangley though, revert the international and system locale settings back to English and everything works just fine.

:)

 

Firewall & Base Filtering Engine

Base Filtering Engine / Windows Firewall missing services, are usually caused by malware.

Here is a detailed guide that'l help you get BFE and Firewall running.

How to Repair Base Filtering Engine Service Startup Problems?

 

Firewall & Base Filtering Engine

After updating to Windows 10, antivirus didn't work anymore. I switched to Windows Defender (which still works), but now windows Firewall isn't working.

The problem seems to be that Base Filtering Engine is missing (searched for it via explorer). The missing BFE seems to prevent me from enabling Windows Firewall and/or installing antivirus software.

Anyone any clue?

 

What is this "Base Filtering Engine" service ?

Hello Raiz,

The Base Filtering Engine (BFE) is a service that manages firewall and Internet Protocol security (IPsec) policies and implements user mode filtering. Stopping or disabling the BFE service will significantly reduce the security of the system. It will also result in unpredictable behavior in IPsec management and firewall applications.

You would want to keep it enabled, running, and set to Automatic.