IMPORTANT NOTICE! From Microsoft:
As of February 11, 2020: On January 22, 2020 we announced that the Microsoft Search in Bing browser extension would be made available through Office 365 ProPlus on Windows devices starting at the end of February. To those of you who provided feedback, thank you for taking the time to share your opinions! Based on your input, we are adjusting our approach to better address the concerns that were raised about managing the rollout. Please note the following changes to the plan:
- The Microsoft Search in Bing browser extension will not be automatically deployed with Office 365 ProPlus.
- Through a new toggle in the Microsoft 365 admin center, administrators will be able to opt in to deploy the browser extension to their organization through Office 365 ProPlus.
- In the near term, Office 365 ProPlus will only deploy the browser extension to AD-joined devices, even within organizations that have opted in. In the future we will add specific settings to govern the deployment of the extension to unmanaged devices.
- We will continue to provide end users who receive the extension with control over their search engine preference.
Due to these changes, the Microsoft Search in Bing extension will not ship with Version 2002 of Office 365 ProPlus. We will deliver a new Message center post once a revised launch date has been determined, and that post will include details on the admin controls that will be available prior to launch. For additional information, please see this blog which will also be updated as plans are announced. Thank you again for your feedback, and please continue to share your input with us through Message center feedback.
Table of Contents
Do you want to start immediately with removing Bing from your browser?
See the posts contents if you prefer to start immediately with switching off Microsoft Bing in Chrome or Firefox.
Choose the option that suits you best.
Microsoft announcing: ‘Microsoft Search in Bing and Office 365 ProPlus‘.
I expect this post to be read more often in the future than it is now, but Microsoft has announced that they will add a new “Microsoft Search” extension in Microsoft ProPlus version 2002.
This extension will adjust the search engine to Microsoft Bing in Google Chrome and Firefox.
The first countries with which they start are:
- Australia
- Canada
- France
- Germany
- India
- United Kingdom
- United States
It is a matter of waiting for it to be rolled out in other countries.
In fact, if you temporarily move to one of these locations you can also get the “Microsoft search Bing in Chrome or Firefox” option:
Also, the location of the device is checked once every month. At that time, if the device has moved to a location listed above, the extension will be installed the next time Office 365 ProPlus is updated to a version that includes the extension.
Microsoft offers various options to disable this, but does not specify completely how to. I will gladly explain this to you in the next section.
See this post from Microsoft for more information:
Microsoft Search in Bing and Office 365 ProPlus
What option to remove Microsoft search from my browser suits me best ?
It’s already enabled!
Microsoft has an important notice for those who have the Microsoft Search extension already enabled:
Whichever exclusion method you use, be sure to implement it before you install or update to a version of Office 365 ProPlus that installs the extension for Microsoft Search in Bing. If you implement the exclusion after the extension has been installed, the extension won’t be removed from the device.
- Disable Microsoft Bing as default browser.
This is a suitable solution if you want to disable this for yourself. - Remove the Microsoft Search extension completely.
This will remove and thus disable Microsoft Bing as default browser.
This is the easiest to automate and to disable for your organization.
This new feature needs to be disabled.
- Local Group Policy
- Office Deployment Tool
- Group Policy Management
- System Center Configuration Manager
- Microsoft Intune
Disable Microsoft Bing as default browser.
This is a suitable solution if you want to disable this for yourself. This way you can always toggle it back on for when it becomes necessary.
Open your default browser (Chrome or Firefox).
Click on the magnifying glass next to the search bar.
I’ve taken the screenshot from the Microsoft website because I cannot install this feature yet.
On the screenshot you see 5 magnifying glasses, but click on the one with a green square around it.
Restart your browser.
Remove the Microsoft Search extension completely.
If you still want to remove the Microsoft Search extension later on, you can always go to Control Panel and remove the extension.
To do this manually you can follow the steps below.
- Go to start and search for Control Panel.
- Go to Programs and select Programs and Featurs.
- Search for DefaultPackPC in the program list.
- Right click DefaultPackPC and choose uninstall.
To do this for your organization and automate this process you can use the following commando.
"C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft\DefaultPackMSI\MainBootStrap.exe" uninstallAllAs Microsoft states you can automate this in different ways:
To deploy that command to multiple devices in your organization, you could use a script, Configuration Manager, or some other enterprise software deployment tool.
Organization wide it depends if it’s an Domain joined device or an BYOD type of device that’s connected to Microsoft Intune.
Either way, for a Domain joined Device I’d add the commando to a login script in Group Policy Management.
With Microsoft Intune I’d add a PowerShell script in the Intune portal.
This new feature needs to be disabled.
Because this is a feature that is not yet enabled, I can now only refer you to Microsoft how you can disable this before the feature is enabled for the most up-to-date content.
How to exclude the extension for Microsoft Search in Bing from being installed.
Should we keep it enabled?
Well, do you prefer this?
By making Bing the default search engine, users in your organization with Google Chrome will be able to take advantage of Microsoft Search, including being able to access relevant workplace information directly from the browser address bar. Microsoft Search is part of Microsoft 365 and is turned on by default for all Microsoft apps that support it.
Then you should keep it enabled.
For future reference
Because this is a feature that is not yet enabled, I cannot determine the content of the blog post yet. I ensure that the content remains up to date with the changes on the Microsoft side.
