In some cases it’s important to have and makes a lot of sense to keep in place. In other cases it’s an annoying setting that refuses to allow itself to be removed from your server. What am I talking about? It’s Internet Explorer’s Enhanced Security Configuration setting that blocks your attempts to browse anyplace useful.
Attempt#2 to Disable IE Enhanced Security Configuration for all Users
In a previous article I mentioned ways I thought would work to get rid of IE’s enhanced security configuration. Alas it was not to be and several steps need to be taken on the server to remove this setting. This is my second attempt to disable this setting on a server for all users.
** As I mentioned before, make sure you actually want to remove this setting before you go ahead and do so. Microsoft has put it there and activated it by default for a reason. Make sure that for your situation it makes sense not to have this active on your server.
Steps to Take
For starters, open up your Server Manager console. Then click the Local Server option on the left hand menu bar. You will now see a series of options, one of which is ‘IE Enhanced Security Configuration‘. Click on the link beside this label to turn this setting off. When you click, you will get a popup window where you are asked to turn the setting off for both Administrative users, as well as for regular users. When you click OK, this setting will be applied.
As a second step, try running the following PowerShell command to update your Windows registry:
Open PowerShell as Administrator. Then enter the code below. I don’t claim responsibility for writing the code, it is posted all over the Internet. I picked this particular snippet up at: http://www.technologynectar.com/how-to-disable-ie-enhanced-security-configuration-server-2012/.
Once you have pasted the code into your PowerShell command console, you will need to press enter twice to get the code to execute. It worked quite nicely for me, but I still have testing to do to check that the two actions I outlined in this article really did properly remove IE’s enhanced security configuration.
function Disable-IEESC{
$AdminKey = “HKLM:\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Active Setup\Installed Components\{A509B1A7-37EF-4b3f-8CFC-4F3A74704073}”
$UserKey = “HKLM:\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Active Setup\Installed Components\{A509B1A8-37EF-4b3f-8CFC-4F3A74704073}”
Set-ItemProperty -Path $AdminKey -Name “IsInstalled” -Value 0
Set-ItemProperty -Path $UserKey -Name “IsInstalled” -Value 0
Stop-Process -Name Explorer
Write-Host “Done Disabling IE Enhanced Security Configuration.” -ForegroundColor Green
}
Disable-IEESC
Justin Cooney 