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Kaspersky Lab and Microsoft simultaneously announced that they've reached common ground on an antitrust complaint the antivirus vendor filed with Russian and European authorities in late 2016 and mid-2017, respectively.

"Kaspersky Lab confirms that all of its concerns regarding the unfair competition law [...] have been addressed," wrote the company in a press release yesterday.

The antivirus vendor also added it would be taking all the steps to withdraw its complaint from both Russian and EU probing bodies.

Kaspersky accused Microsoft of abusing its OS monopoly

Last year, Kaspersky Lab founder Eugene Kaspersky accused Microsoft of using its control over the Windows operating system to push its own anti-malware solution — Windows Defender — on the detriment of third-party software.

Kaspersky accused Microsoft of burying license expiration notifications, quietly deactivating third-party antivirus products, and automatically turning on Windows Defender instead.

In addition, Kaspersky also accused Microsoft of giving third-party AV vendors little time to prepare for new Windows versions, turning off incompatible products, and enabling Windows Defender instead.

Another gripe was that when users activated Windows Defender, Microsoft quietly killed the third-party AV, with almost no visible warning.

Microsoft announces new AV policies

A resolution to all the complaints came after Microsoft agreed to play nice with third-party antivirus vendors. In a statement released yesterday, Microsoft announced changes to the way it treats third-party antivirus software on Windows 10 and a change in the relationship between the company and third-party antivirus vendors.

✱    We will work more closely with AV vendors to help them with compatibility reviews in advance of each feature update becoming available to customers. This means customers can expect we will have worked through compatibility issues with AV providers before offering the update to customers running that AV.
✱    We will give AV partners better visibility and certainty around release schedules for feature updates. This includes increasing the amount of time AV partners will have to review final builds before the next Windows 10 feature update is rolled out to customers.
✱    We will enable AV providers to use their own alerts and notifications to renew antivirus products before and after they have expired.
✱    We have modified how Windows will inform users when their antivirus application has expired and is no longer protecting them. Instead of providing an initial toast notification that users could ignore, the new notification will persist on the screen until the user either elects to renew the existing solution or chooses to rely on Windows Defender or another solution provider.

Microsoft said the changes in how Windows 10 interacts with third-party antivirus software will go live with the release of the Windows 10 Fall Creators Update, scheduled for October or November this year.

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