https://www.theverge.com/2021/9/13/22671182/mozilla-default-browser-windows-protections-firefox

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Filed under:

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Mozilla has defeated Microsoft's default browser protections in
Windows

New, 55 comments

It's easier to switch to Firefox as default now

By Tom Warren@tomwarren Sep 13, 2021, 8:00am EDT

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[acastro_20] Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

Mozilla has quietly made it easier to switch to Firefox on Windows
recently. While Microsoft offers a method to switch default browsers
on Windows 10, it's more cumbersome than the simple one-click process
to switch to Edge. This one-click process isn't officially available
for anyone other than Microsoft, and Mozilla appears to have grown
tired of the situation.

In version 91 of Firefox, released on August 10th, Mozilla has
reverse engineered the way Microsoft sets Edge as default in Windows
10, and enabled Firefox to quickly make itself the default. Before
this change, Firefox users would be sent to the Settings part of
Windows 10 to then have to select Firefox as a default browser and
ignore Microsoft's plea to keep Edge.

Mozilla's reverse engineering means you can now set Firefox as the
default from within the browser, and it does all the work in the
background with no additional prompts. This circumvents Microsoft's
anti-hijacking protections that the company built into Windows 10 to
ensure malware couldn't hijack default apps. Microsoft tells us this
is not supported in Windows.

[gif] [firefoxdef] Firefox now makes it easy to switch default
browsers in Windows.

Mozilla has clearly grown tired of the more complicated way of
setting up a default browser, a process that Microsoft is making even
harder in Windows 11. "People should have the ability to simply and
easily set defaults, but they don't," says a Mozilla spokesperson in
a statement to The Verge. "All operating systems should offer
official developer support for default status so people can easily
set their apps as default. Since that hasn't happened on Windows 10
and 11, Firefox relies on other aspects of the Windows environment to
give people an experience similar to what Windows provides to Edge
when users choose Firefox to be their default browser."

Mozilla has been trying to convince Microsoft to improve its default
browser settings in Windows since its open letter to Microsoft in
2015. Nothing has changed, and Windows 11 is now making it even
harder to switch default browsers. That appears to be the final
straw, as Mozilla began implementing its changes in Firefox shortly
after the Windows 11 unveiling in June.

So far, Google, Vivaldi, Opera, and other Chromium-based browsers
haven't followed Mozilla's lead, and it's not clear exactly how
Microsoft will respond. Microsoft has some genuine security-related
reasons to protect against malware with anti-hijacking, but by
allowing Edge to easily switch defaults it undermines rival browser
vendors that simply want a level playing field. Windows 11 makes that
playing field even more complicated, and competitors aren't happy.

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