Report: Microsoft Edge apparently leaking all websites you visit to Bing API

[Gandalf_The_Grey]

Microsoft Edge added a feature back in January 2022 which allowed users to follow content creators like YouTubers. However, this "follow creators" feature appears to be bugged in the latest update, according to reports online. The issue is pretty big when it comes to data privacy as every website URL visited is seemingly being sent to the Bing API servers "bingapis.com/api/v7/followweb/isfollowable". This is because the follow creators appear to be enabled by default all the time in the latest version, which means every URL or domain visited.

The issue was discovered first by Reddit user hackermchackface a few days ago. He wrote:

What is causing Edge to leak all visited URLs following latest update? API is: bingapis.com/api/v7/followweb/isfollowable ?
GET request includes full url of every page navigate to.
Searching for References to this url give very few results, no documentation on this feature at all. Json response shows type as “FollowableStatus” which yields zero Google results, which is rare.

Microsoft MVP and Stardock engineer Rafael Rivera gave the following statement to The Verge:

Microsoft Edge now has a creator follow feature that is enabled by default, it appears the intent was to notify Bing when you’re on certain pages, such as YouTube, The Verge, and Reddit. But it doesn’t appear to be working correctly, instead sending nearly every domain you visit to Bing

Microsoft has responded to The Verge confirming that it is aware of such reports. Caitlin Roulston, director of communications at Microsoft, has stated:

We’re aware of reports, are investigating and will take appropriate action to address any issues

We will be updating this article when further updates are here.

Report: Microsoft Edge apparently leaking all websites you visit to Bing API

The latest Edge update may be sending data for all the websites and domains you visit to the Bing API server website. The reports are currently being looked into by Microsoft itself.

www.neowin.net

 

[Bot]

There are reports that the "follow creators" feature in the latest update of Microsoft Edge is bugged, which is causing every URL visited to be sent to Bing API servers. This is potentially a big issue for data privacy, as the feature is enabled constantly by default. Microsoft has confirmed that it is aware of the reports and is investigating the issue. Updates will be provided as they become available.

 

[simmerskool]

There are reports that the "follow creators" feature in the latest update of Microsoft Edge is bugged, which is causing every URL visited to be sent to Bing API servers. This is potentially a big issue for data privacy, as the feature is enabled constantly by default. Microsoft has confirmed that it is aware of the reports and is investigating the issue. Updates will be provided as they become available.

can we turn-off "follow creators" please advise the steps to take...

 

[Gandalf_The_Grey]

You can do that here:

 

[oldschool]

I wonder if 'disabled' really means disabled. Nobody should have to wade through all of these crappy 'features' to turn them off, which is why I no longer use it. MS simply insists that we hate Edge by adding all this bloat.

 

[Trident]

I wonder if 'disabled' really means disabled. Nobody should have to wade through all of these crappy 'features' to turn them off, which is why I no longer use it. MS simply insists that we hate Edge by adding all this bloat.

Just when I started to like it, these news pop-up. Chrome it will be. Again.

 

[simmerskool]

I wonder if 'disabled' really means disabled. Nobody should have to wade through all of these crappy 'features' to turn them off, which is why I no longer use it. MS simply insists that we hate Edge by adding all this bloat.

sidenote: my VMware win10_guest had only Edge installed for several months. Also running F-Secure. Runs great, but... I decided to install Chrome yesterday, and I could download Chrome, and its sha256 checked, but I could not get Chrome to install cleanly. It froze and would not install any extensions. I had to kill it with Task Manager. It felt like something Windows was blocking it. I tried 2 or 3 different times. Same. Could have been anything, but... Running firefox in linux today.