Microsoft has a fix for Windows 10's Password Saving issue

Shortly after the release of Windows 10 version 2004 in April 2020, some users reported issues getting passwords to save in web browsers such as Google Chrome or Microsoft Edge, and also in other applications such as OneDrive or Outlook.

Microsoft acknowledged the issue in June 2020 and published a support page on its official support site.

Microsoft is actively investigating on this topic; our metrics for OSCrypt.Win.KeyDecryptionError do not show a huge or significantly growing number of hits, but it's big enough that we're looking at it. It would be interesting to see whether Chrome's data for that metric shows movement over time.

The support page informs users that the issue is caused by certain Windows 10 Task Scheduler tasks such as HP Customer participation utility task, and that it affects devices running Windows 10 Version 2004 Build 19041.173 or later.

Microsoft's workaround suggests to run a Powershell command to list tasks that affect the password saving functionality on the operating system.

1. Start an elevated Windows PowerShell prompt.
2. Run the command Get-ScheduledTask | foreach { If (([xml](Export-ScheduledTask -TaskName $_.TaskName -TaskPath $_.TaskPath)).GetElementsByTagName("LogonType").'#text' -eq "S4U") { $_.TaskName } }
3. Note tasks listed by the command.
4. Open the Windows Task Scheduler.
5. Locate the tasks listed by the PowerShell command, right-click on each and select disable.
6. Restart Windows.

Microsoft Edge Program Manager Eric Lawrence confirmed on December 18, 2020 that Microsoft has found a permanent fix for the issue. The company has integrated the fix in the latest Windows 10 Insider Build and plans to include it in an upcoming update for all Windows 10 users. The exact release date is unclear; the most likely scenario will see a release as part of a coming cumulative update.

The next cumulative updates will be released on January 12, 2021, February 9, 2021 and March 9, 2021 respectively.

Lawrence notes that a "comparatively small number of users with S4U tasks" is affected by the issue.

Now You: have you been affected by the issue (via Windows Latest)

Thank you for being a Ghacks reader. The post Microsoft has a fix for Windows 10's Password Saving issue appeared first on gHacks Technology News.