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Cortana & Search Settings

O&O ShutUp10 provides control over Cortana and Windows Search behavior. These settings are available in both the Free and Premium Editions.

O&O ShutUp10 Free Edition — Current User tab showing privacy settings including Cortana and search-related options

Overview​

Cortana and Windows Search can send search queries, voice data, and usage patterns to Microsoft. O&O ShutUp10 allows you to limit or disable these features for greater privacy.

What You Can Control​

Web Search in Start Menu​

By default, Windows sends your Start menu search queries to Bing. You can disable web search results to keep your searches local to your device.

Cortana Voice Activation​

Cortana can listen for voice commands. You can disable voice activation to prevent any ambient audio processing.

Search History​

Windows stores your search history to improve future results. You can disable search history collection.

Windows Search can include results from your cloud services (OneDrive, Outlook, etc.). You can limit search to local content only.

Search Indexing​

Control how Windows indexes files and content for search, including which locations are indexed and what content types are included.

tip

Disabling web search in the Start menu is one of the most popular privacy adjustments, as it prevents every local search from being sent to Microsoft's servers.