How to Enable or Disable Tracking Prevention in Microsoft Edge

This is a straightforward guide to enabling or disabling the Edge tracking prevention feature in Windows 11. This built-in feature is designed to enhance user privacy by blocking known trackers across websites. If you’re part of an MSP or IT enterprise, you may want to strongly consider managing tracking prevention to minimize behavioral profiling and reduce the likelihood of personalized advertisements tracking users across the internet.

Other reasons why you may want to prevent browser tracking include:

• Enforce consistent privacy standards across the organization by locking down configurable tracking levels.
• Block cross-site tracking and restrict third-party behavioral analytics, which can pose privacy and IT compliance risks.
• Improve compatibility with trusted internal applications by loosening restrictions where necessary.
• Prevent end-user overrides, ensuring that security and privacy policies stay in effect on shared or managed systems.

📌 Recommended deployment strategies

Managing Microsoft Edge tracking prevention

Method 1: Using Microsoft Edge Settings

📌 Use Cases: Ideal for individual users who want to customize their own browser privacy

📌 Prerequisites:

• You do not need administrator rights for this.
• Requires Microsoft Edge version 79 or later

Steps:

1. Open Microsoft Edge.
2. Navigate to Settings > Privacy, search, and services.
3. Find the Tracking prevention section.
4. Toggle the main switch:
   • On: Tracking prevention is enabled.
   • Off: Tracking prevention is disabled.
5. If enabled, choose a protection level:
   • Basic: Allows most trackers, only blocks known malicious ones.
   • Balanced: This is set by default and blocks trackers from sites you haven’t interacted with.
   • Strict: Blocks nearly all trackers but can break some site functionality.
6. (Optional) Toggle Always use “Strict” tracking prevention when browsing InPrivate.

Method 2: Using Group Policy

📌 Use Cases: Recommended for IT administrations managing corporate desktops and VDI environments who require uniform tracking protection across all devices

📌 Prerequisites:

• You need administrative rights.
• Make sure you download the latest Microsoft Edge ADMX templates.
• You must have Group Policy access.

Steps:

1. Install Microsoft Edge ADMX templates if not already present.
2. Press Win + R, type gpedit.msc, and click Enter.
3. Navigate to: Computer Configuration > Administrative Templates > Microsoft Edge > Privacy and services
4. Set the following policies:
   • Enable tracking prevention: Set to Enabled to turn it on or Disabled to turn it off.
   • Tracking prevention level: Choose from Basic, Balanced, or Strict. The descriptions of each can be found in Method 1.
5. Click Ok.
6. Open an elevated Command Prompt and execute gpudate /force to apply the changes immediately. Alternatively, you can restart your computer.

Method 3: Using Registry Editor

📌 Use cases: Useful for script-based deployments on machines not joined to a domain or for one-off configurations

📌 Prerequisites:

• You must have administrative privileges.
• It is highly recommended that you back up your Registry before attempting any changes. Incorrect configurations can lead to system instability.

Steps:

1. Press Win + R, type regedit, and click Enter.
2. Go to: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Edge
3. Create or edit the following values:

TrackingPrevention (DWORD)

• • 0: Disabled
  • 1: Enabled

TrackingPreventionLevel (REG_SZ)

• • “Basic”
  • “Balanced”
  • “Strict”

💡 Tip: To understand what each level does, please refer to the steps mentioned in Method 1.

4. Exit Registry Editor.
5. Restart Microsoft Edge to apply the new settings.

Method 4: Using PowerShell

📌 Use cases: Excellent for IT teams looking to push configurations through scripts or endpoint management systems like NinjaOne

📌 Prerequisites:

• Requires an elevated PowerShell session
• It is preferable to have knowledge of script signing policies and local admin rights.
• It is recommended that you sign up for the free crash course, PowerShell for IT Ninjas.

Steps: 

1. Open an elevated PowerShell session.
2. Execute the commands, as needed:

Enable tracking prevention (balanced level): 

New-Item -Path "HKLM:\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Edge" -Force

Set-ItemProperty -Path "HKLM:\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Edge" -Name "TrackingPrevention" -Value 1

Set-ItemProperty -Path "HKLM:\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Edge" -Name "TrackingPreventionLevel" -Value "Balanced"

Disable tracking prevention:

Set-ItemProperty -Path "HKLM:\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Edge" -Name "TrackingPrevention" -Value 0

Remove-ItemProperty -Path "HKLM:\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Edge" -Name "TrackingPreventionLevel" -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue

Method 5: .reg file example

📌 Use Cases: Useful for small-scale deployment or when administrators don’t want to maintain full scripting frameworks.

📌 Prerequisites:

• You must have admin privileges and file access.
• Ensure the source of the .reg file is trusted to avoid malicious registry entries.

Steps:

1. Open Notepad.
2. Place the desired command:

(A) Enable tracking prevention (strict)

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Edge]

"TrackingPrevention"=dword:00000001

"TrackingPreventionLevel"="Strict"

(B) Disable tracking prevention

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft\Edge]

"TrackingPrevention"=dword:00000000

3. Save as a .reg file.

⚠️ Things to look out for

Enforce consistent UI behavior by modifying the Edge tracking prevention feature

Tracking prevention in Microsoft Edge is a cornerstone of browser-based privacy management. For IT professionals and MSPs, it represents a practical lever to enforce data protection and align with security policies across environments.

Related topics:

• How to Enable or Disable Send Do Not Track Requests in Microsoft Edge in Windows 10
• What Is Geo-Tracking?
• What Is Geofencing?