Windows 10: Security baseline (DRAFT) release for Chromium-based Microsoft Edge 79

Brink · Dec 13, 2019

Microsoft is pleased to announce the draft release of the recommended security configuration baseline settings for the next version of Microsoft Edge based on Chromium, version 79. Please evaluate this proposed baseline and send us your feedback through the Baselines Discussion site.

The settings recommended in this baseline are identical to the ones we recommended in the version 78 draft. None of the settings introduced in the version 79 policies meet the bar for inclusion in the baseline for broad use. We are republishing the baseline package because the names of several of the recommended settings were changed (for example, references to “SSL” were replaced with “HTTPS” or “TLS”).

Like all our baseline packages, the downloadable draft baseline package (attached to this blog post) includes importable GPOs, a script to apply the GPOs to local policy, a script to import the GPOs into Active Directory Group Policy, and all the recommended settings in spreadsheet form, as Policy Analyzer rules, and as GP Reports. It also includes a spreadsheet showing the changes in the available GPO settings between versions 78 and 79.

Microsoft Edge is being rebuilt with the open-source Chromium project, and many of its security configuration options are inherited from that project. These Group Policy settings are entirely distinct from those for the original version of Microsoft Edge built into Windows 10: they are in different folders in the Group Policy editor and they reference different registry keys. The Group Policy settings that control the new version of Microsoft Edge are located under “Administrative Templates\Microsoft Edge,” while those that control the current version of Microsoft Edge remain located under “Administrative Templates\Windows Components\Microsoft Edge.” You can download the latest policy templates for the new version of Microsoft Edge from the Microsoft Edge Enterprise landing page. To learn more about managing the new version of Microsoft Edge, see Configure Microsoft Edge for Windows.

As with our current Windows and Office security baselines, our recommendations for Microsoft Edge configuration follow a streamlined and efficient approach to baseline definition when compared with the baselines we published before Windows 10. The foundation of that approach is essentially this:

The baselines are designed for well-managed, security-conscious organizations in which standard end users do not have administrative rights.

A baseline enforces a setting only if it mitigates a contemporary security threat and does not cause operational issues that are worse than the risks they mitigate.

A baseline enforces a default only if it is otherwise likely to be set to an insecure state by an authorized user:

If a non-administrator can set an insecure state, enforce the default.

If setting an insecure state requires administrative rights, enforce the default only if it is likely that a misinformed administrator will otherwise choose poorly.

(For further explanation, see the “Why aren’t we enforcing more defaults?” section in this blog post.)

Version 79 of the Chromium-based version of Microsoft Edge has 217 enforceable Computer Configuration policy settings and another 201 User Configuration policy settings. Following our streamlined approach, our recommended baseline configures a grand total of twelve Group Policy settings. You can find full documentation in the download package’s Documentation subdirectory.
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Source: https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/...e/ba-p/1066051

:)

Brink · Dec 13, 2019

Security baseline (DRAFT) for Chromium based Microsoft Edge version 78

Microsoft is pleased to announce the draft release of the recommended security configuration baseline settings for the next version of Microsoft Edge based on Chromium, version 78. Please evaluate this proposed baseline and send us your feedback through the Baselines Discussion site.

Like all our baseline packages, the downloadable draft baseline package (attached to this blog post) includes importable GPOs, a script to apply the GPOs to local policy, a script to import the GPOs into Active Directory Group Policy, and all the recommended settings in spreadsheet form, as Policy Analyzer rules, and as GP Reports.

Microsoft Edge is being rebuilt with the open-source Chromium project, and many of its security configuration options are inherited from that project. These Group Policy settings are entirely distinct from those for the original version of Microsoft Edge built into Windows 10: they are in different folders in the Group Policy editor and they reference different registry keys. The Group Policy settings that control the new version of Microsoft Edge are located under “Administrative Templates\Microsoft Edge,” while those that control the current version of Microsoft Edge remain located under “Administrative Templates\Windows Components\Microsoft Edge.” You can download the latest policy templates for the new version of Microsoft Edge from the Microsoft Edge Enterprise landing page. To learn more about managing the new version of Microsoft Edge, see Configure Microsoft Edge for Windows.

As with our current Windows and Office security baselines, our recommendations for Microsoft Edge configuration follow a streamlined and efficient approach to baseline definition when compared with the baselines we published before Windows 10. The foundation of that approach is essentially this:

The baselines are designed for well-managed, security-conscious organizations in which standard end users do not have administrative rights.

A baseline enforces a setting only if it mitigates a contemporary security threat and does not cause operational issues that are worse than the risks they mitigate.

A baseline enforces a default only if it is otherwise likely to be set to an insecure state by an authorized user:

If a non-administrator can set an insecure state, enforce the default.

If setting an insecure state requires administrative rights, enforce the default only if it is likely that a misinformed administrator will otherwise choose poorly.

(For further explanation, see the “Why aren’t we enforcing more defaults?” section in this blog post.)

Version 78 of the Chromium-based version of Microsoft Edge has 205 enforceable Computer Configuration policy settings and another 190 User Configuration policy settings. Following our streamlined approach, our recommended baseline configures a grand total of twelve Group Policy settings. You can find full documentation in the download package’s Documentation subdirectory.
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Source: https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/...ge/ba-p/949991

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Brink · Dec 13, 2019

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.

Download the content here: Windows-10-1809-Security-Baseline-DRAFT.zip

The downloadable attachment to this blog post includes importable GPOs, a PowerShell script for applying the GPOs to local policy, custom ADMX files for Group Policy settings, documentation in spreadsheet form and as a Policy Analyzer file (MSFT-Win10-v1809-RS5-WS2019-DRAFT.PolicyRules). In this release, we have changed the documentation layout in a few ways:

MS Security Baseline Windows 10 v1809 and Server 2019.xlsx – multi-tabbed workbook listing all Group Policy settings that ship in-box with Windows 10 v1809 or Windows Server 2019. Columns for “Windows 10 v1809,” “WS2019 Member Server,” and “WS2019 DC” show the recommended settings for those three scenarios. A small number of cells are color-coded to indicate that the settings should not be applied to systems that are not joined to an Active Directory domain. Cells in the “WS2019 DC” columns are also highlighted when they differ from the corresponding cells in the “WS2019 Member Server” column. Another change from past spreadsheets is that we have combined tabs that used to be separate. Specifically, we are no longer breaking out Internet Explorer and Windows Defender AV settings into separate tabs, nor the settings for LAPS, MS Security Guide, and MSS (Legacy). All these settings are now in the Computer and User tabs.

BaselineDiffs-to-v1809-RS5-DRAFT.xlsx – This Policy Analyzer-generated workbook lists the differences in Microsoft security configuration baselines between the new baselines and the corresponding previous baselines. The Windows 10 v1809 settings are compared against those for Windows 10 v1803, and the Windows Server 2019 baselines are compared against those for Windows Server 2016.

Windows 10 1803 to 1809 New Settings.xlsx – Lists all the settings that are available in Windows 10 v1809 that were added since Windows 10 v1803. (We used to highlight these settings in the big all-settings spreadsheets.)

Server 2016 to 2019 New Settings.xlsx – Lists all the settings that are available in Windows Server 2019 that were added since Windows Server 2016. (We used to highlight these settings in the big all-settings spreadsheets.)

Highlights of the differences from past baselines, which are listed in BaselineDiffs-to-v1809-RS5-DRAFT.xlsx:

The MS Security Guide custom setting protecting against potentially unwanted applications (PUA) has been deprecated, and is now implemented with a new setting under Computer Configuration\...\Windows Defender Antivirus.

We have enabled the “Encryption Oracle Remediation” setting we had considered for v1803. At the time we were concerned that enabling the newly-introduced setting would break too many not-yet-patched systems. We assume that systems have since been brought up to date. (You can read information about the setting here and here.)

Changes to Virtualization-Based Security settings (used by Credential Guard and Code Integrity):

“Platform Security Level” changed from “Secure Boot and DMA Protection” to “Secure Boot.” If system hardware doesn’t support DMA protection, selecting “Secure Boot and DMA Protection” prevents Credential Guard from operating. If you can affirm that your systems support the DMA protection feature, choose the stronger option. We have opted for “Secure Boot” (only) in the baseline to reduce the likelihood that Credential Guard fails to run.

Enabled the new System Guard Secure Launch setting which will enable Secure Launch on new capable hardware. Secure Launch changes the way windows boots to use Intel Trusted Execution Technology (TXT) and Runtime BIOS Resilience features to prevent firmware exploits from being able to impact the security of the Windows Virtualization Based Security environment.

Enabled the “Require UEFI Memory Attributes Table” option.

Enabled the new Kernel DMA Protection feature described here. The “External device enumeration” policy controls whether to enumerate external devices that are not compatible with DMA-remapping. Devices that are compatible with DMA-remapping are always enumerated.

Removed the BitLocker setting, “Allow Secure Boot for integrity validation,” as it merely enforced a default that was unlikely to be modified even by a misguided administrator.

Removed the BitLocker setting, “Configure minimum PIN length for startup,” as new hardware features reduce the need for a startup PIN, and the setting increased Windows’ minimum by only one character.

Enabled the new Microsoft Edge setting to prevent users from bypassing certificate error messages, bringing Edge in line with a similar setting for Internet Explorer.

Removed the block against handling PKU2U authentication requests, as the feature is increasingly necessary.

Removed the configuration of the “Create symbolic links” user rights assignment, as it merely enforced a default, was unlikely to be modified by a misguided administrator or for malicious purposes, and needs to be changed to a different value when Hyper-V is enabled.

Removed the deny-logon restrictions against the Guests group as unnecessary: by default, the Guest account is the only member of the Guests group, and the Guest account is disabled. Only an administrator can enable the Guest account or add members to the Guests group.

Removed the disabling of the xbgm (“Xbox Game Monitoring”) service, as it is not present in Windows 10 v1809. (By the way, consumer services such as the Xbox services have been removed from Windows Server 2019 with Desktop Experience!)

Removed Credential Guard from the Domain Controller baseline. (Credential Guard is not useful on domain controllers and is not supported there.)

Created and enabled a new custom MS Security Guide setting for the domain controller baseline, “Extended Protection for LDAP Authentication (Domain Controllers only),” which configures the LdapEnforceChannelBinding registry value described here.

The Server 2019 baselines pick up all the changes accumulated in the four Windows 10 releases since Windows Server 2016.

We have replaced the collection of .cmd batch files for applying the baselines to local policy with a single PowerShell script that takes one of these five command-line switches to indicate which baseline you want to apply:.\BaselineLocalInstall.ps1 -Win10DomainJoined - for Windows 10 v1809, domain-joined
.\BaselineLocalInstall.ps1 -Win10NonDomainJoined - for Windows 10 v1809, non-domain-joined
.\BaselineLocalInstall.ps1 -WS2019Member - for Windows Server 2019, domain-joined
.\BaselineLocalInstall.ps1 -WS2019NonDomainJoined - for Windows Server 2019, non-domain-joined
.\BaselineLocalInstall.ps1 -WS2019DomainController - for Windows Server 2019, domain controller
A couple of important notes about using the BaselineLocalInstall.ps1 script:

PowerShell execution policy must be configured to allow script execution. You can configure this with a command line such as the following:
Set-ExecutionPolicy RemoteSigned

LGPO.exe must be in the Tools subdirectory or somewhere in the Path. LGPO.exe is part of the Security Compliance Toolkit and can be downloaded from this URL:
https://www.microsoft.com/download/d....aspx?id=55319

Windows 10 v1809 has greatly expanded its manageability using Mobile Device Management (MDM). The Intune team is preparing documentation about the Microsoft Windows MDM security baseline and how to use Intune to implement the baseline, and will publish it very soon. We will post information to this blog when that happens.
Click to expand...

Source: Security baseline (DRAFT) for Windows 10 v1809 and Windows Server 2019 Microsoft Security Guidance blog

Download: Windows-10-1809-Security-Baseline-DRAFT.zip

Brink · Dec 13, 2019

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.

Download the content here: Windows-10-1809-Security-Baseline-DRAFT.zip

The downloadable attachment to this blog post includes importable GPOs, a PowerShell script for applying the GPOs to local policy, custom ADMX files for Group Policy settings, documentation in spreadsheet form and as a Policy Analyzer file (MSFT-Win10-v1809-RS5-WS2019-DRAFT.PolicyRules). In this release, we have changed the documentation layout in a few ways:

MS Security Baseline Windows 10 v1809 and Server 2019.xlsx – multi-tabbed workbook listing all Group Policy settings that ship in-box with Windows 10 v1809 or Windows Server 2019. Columns for “Windows 10 v1809,” “WS2019 Member Server,” and “WS2019 DC” show the recommended settings for those three scenarios. A small number of cells are color-coded to indicate that the settings should not be applied to systems that are not joined to an Active Directory domain. Cells in the “WS2019 DC” columns are also highlighted when they differ from the corresponding cells in the “WS2019 Member Server” column. Another change from past spreadsheets is that we have combined tabs that used to be separate. Specifically, we are no longer breaking out Internet Explorer and Windows Defender AV settings into separate tabs, nor the settings for LAPS, MS Security Guide, and MSS (Legacy). All these settings are now in the Computer and User tabs.

BaselineDiffs-to-v1809-RS5-DRAFT.xlsx – This Policy Analyzer-generated workbook lists the differences in Microsoft security configuration baselines between the new baselines and the corresponding previous baselines. The Windows 10 v1809 settings are compared against those for Windows 10 v1803, and the Windows Server 2019 baselines are compared against those for Windows Server 2016.

Windows 10 1803 to 1809 New Settings.xlsx – Lists all the settings that are available in Windows 10 v1809 that were added since Windows 10 v1803. (We used to highlight these settings in the big all-settings spreadsheets.)

Server 2016 to 2019 New Settings.xlsx – Lists all the settings that are available in Windows Server 2019 that were added since Windows Server 2016. (We used to highlight these settings in the big all-settings spreadsheets.)

Highlights of the differences from past baselines, which are listed in BaselineDiffs-to-v1809-RS5-DRAFT.xlsx:

The MS Security Guide custom setting protecting against potentially unwanted applications (PUA) has been deprecated, and is now implemented with a new setting under Computer Configuration\...\Windows Defender Antivirus.

We have enabled the “Encryption Oracle Remediation” setting we had considered for v1803. At the time we were concerned that enabling the newly-introduced setting would break too many not-yet-patched systems. We assume that systems have since been brought up to date. (You can read information about the setting here and here.)

Changes to Virtualization-Based Security settings (used by Credential Guard and Code Integrity):

“Platform Security Level” changed from “Secure Boot and DMA Protection” to “Secure Boot.” If system hardware doesn’t support DMA protection, selecting “Secure Boot and DMA Protection” prevents Credential Guard from operating. If you can affirm that your systems support the DMA protection feature, choose the stronger option. We have opted for “Secure Boot” (only) in the baseline to reduce the likelihood that Credential Guard fails to run.

Enabled the new System Guard Secure Launch setting which will enable Secure Launch on new capable hardware. Secure Launch changes the way windows boots to use Intel Trusted Execution Technology (TXT) and Runtime BIOS Resilience features to prevent firmware exploits from being able to impact the security of the Windows Virtualization Based Security environment.

Enabled the “Require UEFI Memory Attributes Table” option.

Enabled the new Kernel DMA Protection feature described here. The “External device enumeration” policy controls whether to enumerate external devices that are not compatible with DMA-remapping. Devices that are compatible with DMA-remapping are always enumerated.

Removed the BitLocker setting, “Allow Secure Boot for integrity validation,” as it merely enforced a default that was unlikely to be modified even by a misguided administrator.

Removed the BitLocker setting, “Configure minimum PIN length for startup,” as new hardware features reduce the need for a startup PIN, and the setting increased Windows’ minimum by only one character.

Enabled the new Microsoft Edge setting to prevent users from bypassing certificate error messages, bringing Edge in line with a similar setting for Internet Explorer.

Removed the block against handling PKU2U authentication requests, as the feature is increasingly necessary.

Removed the configuration of the “Create symbolic links” user rights assignment, as it merely enforced a default, was unlikely to be modified by a misguided administrator or for malicious purposes, and needs to be changed to a different value when Hyper-V is enabled.

Removed the deny-logon restrictions against the Guests group as unnecessary: by default, the Guest account is the only member of the Guests group, and the Guest account is disabled. Only an administrator can enable the Guest account or add members to the Guests group.

Removed the disabling of the xbgm (“Xbox Game Monitoring”) service, as it is not present in Windows 10 v1809. (By the way, consumer services such as the Xbox services have been removed from Windows Server 2019 with Desktop Experience!)

Removed Credential Guard from the Domain Controller baseline. (Credential Guard is not useful on domain controllers and is not supported there.)

Created and enabled a new custom MS Security Guide setting for the domain controller baseline, “Extended Protection for LDAP Authentication (Domain Controllers only),” which configures the LdapEnforceChannelBinding registry value described here.

The Server 2019 baselines pick up all the changes accumulated in the four Windows 10 releases since Windows Server 2016.

We have replaced the collection of .cmd batch files for applying the baselines to local policy with a single PowerShell script that takes one of these five command-line switches to indicate which baseline you want to apply:.\BaselineLocalInstall.ps1 -Win10DomainJoined - for Windows 10 v1809, domain-joined
.\BaselineLocalInstall.ps1 -Win10NonDomainJoined - for Windows 10 v1809, non-domain-joined
.\BaselineLocalInstall.ps1 -WS2019Member - for Windows Server 2019, domain-joined
.\BaselineLocalInstall.ps1 -WS2019NonDomainJoined - for Windows Server 2019, non-domain-joined
.\BaselineLocalInstall.ps1 -WS2019DomainController - for Windows Server 2019, domain controller
A couple of important notes about using the BaselineLocalInstall.ps1 script:

PowerShell execution policy must be configured to allow script execution. You can configure this with a command line such as the following:
Set-ExecutionPolicy RemoteSigned

LGPO.exe must be in the Tools subdirectory or somewhere in the Path. LGPO.exe is part of the Security Compliance Toolkit and can be downloaded from this URL:
https://www.microsoft.com/download/d....aspx?id=55319

Windows 10 v1809 has greatly expanded its manageability using Mobile Device Management (MDM). The Intune team is preparing documentation about the Microsoft Windows MDM security baseline and how to use Intune to implement the baseline, and will publish it very soon. We will post information to this blog when that happens.
Click to expand...

Source: Security baseline (DRAFT) for Windows 10 v1809 and Windows Server 2019 Microsoft Security Guidance blog

Download: Windows-10-1809-Security-Baseline-DRAFT.zip

Windows 10: Security baseline (DRAFT) release for Chromium-based Microsoft Edge 79

Security baseline (DRAFT) release for Chromium-based Microsoft Edge 79

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