Have you ever opened a website just for it to prompt you to turn on
notifications for it immediately? Or even worse — have you found
yourself accepting those prompts, only for that website to proceed to
bombard you with spammy notifications? Microsoft is hoping to end that
in its Edge browser
Microsoft Edge has been in the news lately for its AI additions, but there have been a few other features in the pipeline. A common method of spam distribution over the past few years is through website notifications, with those websites throwing spam via browser notifications at you. You’re safe as long as you block notifications from that website, but if you make the mistake of hitting “Accept,” all hell breaks loose. This is what Microsoft Edge is aiming to fix here.
Now, Microsoft Edge is blocking these request prompts on “unfamiliar” sites. The prompt will still be there, but it will be shown quietly on the search bar with a bell icon. The browser will also explain that the website was considered “unfamiliar” and therefore notifications were blocked just in case. If you want to still enable notifications for that website despite the potential risks, you’re welcome to go up to the bell icon and click “Allow.”
This is not the only measure Microsoft is working on. The company’s Digital Crimes Unit has also worked to analyze these notifications and identify their providers in hand with law enforcement. Microsoft says that it has removed notification privileges from many of the websites sending out these notifications. While it’s next to impossible to go over all of them, this does mean that most of the (bigger) sites might not send you scammy notifications at all. And for those who still do, the feature we mentioned above should still help you keep them at bay.
Finally, if you happen to turn on notifications, there’s also an easy way to stop the bombarding if you’re regretting the mistake. Simply right-click on one of the scammy notifications and click on “turn off all notifications.” This gives you an easy way to revert the mistake and bring peace back to your computer.
These changes are rolling out now, so make sure to keep your browser updated.
Source: Microsoft
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