Windows Defender which was running in my windows 10 Home x64 has disappeared while there was no other antivirus installed in my PC, the link to start windows defender is there but nothing running if I click on it, I tried gpedit and could not find folder in the group editor for windows defender so I assume it is not disabled in the group policy, I tried scannow to check for missing windows files the scan completed but no changes, what can I do to restore Windows defender?I have installed Avast AV for the present time.
Any help is very much appreciated.
Did you open Settings and checked as on Attachment below, if you have already.....Uninstalling Avast should reinstall Defender.
I have tried uninstalling AVAST it did not bring Windows Defender back,I actually installed AVAST because Windows defender is lost, I have attached snap shots of the settings to show that windows Defender is missing in the group policy editor that is why it is not turning on.
I appreciate your further help to see if I can solve this issue.
Thank you
As you said in the first post...windows Defender is missing in the group policy editor that is why it is not turning on......I'm wondering how you managed to open Group Policy on the Home edition when it's supposed to be restricted to Pro and above. Maybe that's why it is missing bits? Or maybe you're looking in the wrong place. In this Tutorial......my windows 10 Home x64...
Windows Defender - Turn On or Off in Windows 10
...it's shown on the Standard tab, not the Extended one shown in your screenshot. Failing that, Option 2 is the regedit way for all editions.
I have added the regedit.msc option in windows 10 home by installing it, it was available from website, otherwise it was not possible.in the group policy you have to extend windows components to look for Windows Defender folder in order to configure it, but as you see this folder is missing, I have always updated my windows to recent build but windows defender never return, it was available when I updated my Windows 7 home to Windows 10 Home free but after sometime it was crashed or damaged by virus since then I could not get it back to work, it is also not possible to reinstall it in windows 10 as I have downloaded the installation files but it could not install , the installation says windows defender is included in windows 10 and asked to close installation, so I am looking for help to solve this issue, if you have same version of windows 10 home .
Thanks
According to @Brink (and who am I do disagree)......perhaps your doing so is the root cause of your problems....I find that trying to add Group Policy to an unsupported edition usually ends in disaster...
The gpedit.msc is file that can be installed in pervious versions of windows, and can be uninstalled easy same way, may be can be used as portable file from USB stick, it just edit the group policy and expects to do no harm, I have added it and removed it later.
I am not sure if Windows 10 Home edition why is lacking this gpsedit.msc? it should be there as it is needed to enable or disable some programs, any way to get help from Microsoft?
