Microsoft is deprecating the use of Office Defender Application Guard and Windows Security Isolation interfaces and is recommending Defender for Endpoint attack mitigation rules, Protected View, and Windows Defender Application Control as alternatives.
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Office Application Guard is a feature that works with Word, Excel, and PowerPoint for Microsoft 365 apps, specifically serving Enterprise editions of Windows 10 and Windows 11.
Its main goal is to prevent potential threats by restricting files downloaded from untrusted sources, ensuring they are opened within a secure environment, and preventing access to untrusted resources on the user's device
These secure containers protect the device using hardware-based virtualization from potential malware after opening downloaded documents in Office applications.
Microsoft announced that “support for Microsoft Defender Application Guard for Office will be discontinued and will no longer be updated. This retirement also includes the Windows.Security.Isolation interfaces used for Microsoft Defender Application Guard for Office.”
“We recommend that you switch to Microsoft Defender for Endpoint attack mitigation rules, along with Windows Registry Protector Protected View and Application Control, to improve the quality and security of your system.“
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The announcement comes two years after Office Application Guard was introduced to all Microsoft 365 customers with supported licenses. It was officially released as part of a limited preview in November 2019 and was only available to organizations with Microsoft 365 E5 or Microsoft 365 E5 Security licenses.
In October, the company announced that it would abandon VBScript in future versions of Windows, 30 years after its introduction, making it available as an on-demand feature before being removed completely.
Earlier this year, Microsoft announced that it would retire WordPad after 28 years and recalled that Windows would disable the non-insecure Transport Layer Security (TLS) 1.0 and 1.1 protocols, but postponed the retirement of Client Access Rules (CARs) in Exchange Online for one year until September 2024.
Five years ago, Microsoft also announced that the classic Windows Paint app would be retired and removed with the release of the Windows 10 Fall Creator's Update in July 2017.
However, the company decided not to abandon it completely and instead made it available through the Microsoft Store after an outpouring of love for the app.
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Microsoft decided to retire Defender Application Guard for Office for several reasons. One of the reasons is the changing needs and priorities of Office users. The company recognizes that Office users have different requirements and preferences when it comes to the security of their documents. In addition, Microsoft is focused on developing and improving other Office features and tools.
Source: bleepingcomputer
