Allow removal of "Connected to Windows" accounts from Edge profiles

[tboggs]

I love being able to create multiple profiles for the various accounts and services I have to use, I am now up to 7. It's great to be able to separate them and just utilize sso to do what I need without constantly having to login to each admin console.

The problem is that every once in a while, my "Connected to Windows" account get associated with a profile and it becomes a royal nuisance. The only way I have seen to fix it is to delete the profile and start over and that hasn't always worked.

On any profile, you can "Sign-Out" or "Sign-Out and Forget" a non-Connected to Windows account. I would like to see the option to "Remove from this Profile" option for the Connected to Windows account.

It would also be great if when setting up a new profile there was a more streamlined process to add a work account that won't let the company manage the pc and is only for this application. Perhaps after adding one work account to Edge, the default should be reversed?

[#2]

@tboggs Thanks for that feedback!

Since I'm not as familiar with the intricacies of profile connections between MSFT Edge and Windows, I'm looping in our Profile area owner,  @Avi Vaid, to review this as well.

Fawkes (they/them)
Program Manager & Community Manager - Microsoft Edge

[#3 · Accepted solution]

Thanks for the feedback, we've heard this from other users too. Re: the connected to windows accounts, we are working to remove this but since it is cross group collaboration, it may take a while. We eventually would like to just sign you in with the profile account. 

Re: Adding an account only to the app, if you select the "This app only" option in the sign in flow where you are asked to manage the device, the account won't be added to the computer and nor will your device get managed.

[#4]

This is still an issue. When using multiple profiles signed in with Office 365 accounts, it still shows the one connected to windows. This makes it really easy to mess things up, like managing office 365 when your main account has some admin permissions and a secondary account has full permissions. Even when you launch your secondary profile, you get prompted for 'which account' you want to use... and I always seem to click the wrong one. Is there any setting for -not- passing through the 'connected to windows' accounts per profile? If not, what's the best place to up vote feedback?

[#5]

This is really admin unfriendly, it makes me irrationally upset everytime i try and use my admin profile for admin tasks but Edge decides to use my Windows login details as the default. I get that this is nice for the majority of end users who are interested in syncing browser data with Microsoft but haven't we Administrators suffered enough? (its been a long day)

[#6]

This is exactly my use case. I also need this fixed.

[#7]

@tboggs I'm having this same issue too. Any updates on this error from Microsoft?

My environment is slightly different, but same result.

We migrated from one 365 tenant to another.

Now the old accounts cannot be removed from the client PC.

I can connect to the old account through the "Manage" option in Windows Email & Account Settings, but I cannot find anywhere to remove the PC. Only "Deactivate."

This seemingly does nothing to the 365 accounts in Windows Email & Account Settings.

[#8]

@Spider_Sam 

I have profiles in Edge for my work account and then about 20 customer M365 Admin profiles and this habit of signing in with the locally connected account (mine) is really annoying.

Please fix so that the profile can ONLY know about the account we actually sign it in with.

It's really annoying and a huge time waster.

[#9]

I agree, this is a daily nuisance for me to. It's annoying to need to select the right account for every new tab you open (that uses Azure AD as IdP), but in some scenarios I am automatically logged in with my Windows Account in a profile dedicated to a customer. That can lead to bad things. Please let us hide the Connected to Windows account in Edge profiles.

[#10]

Hi @Avi Vaid. Is there a way that you know of that we can track progress on this issue?

[#11]

Right on the 2nd bit - but if you accidentally leave the check box - then there is no way out!
I have about 12 different accounts to manage and all it takes is one time to miss that check box - and boom! Now how do I get this account NOT connected to windows! Or how do I change the account? I do have an account I would prefer - but when I tried to leave that manage checkbox on purpose for that account - it gave an error - could not do it! (so presume cannot switch/change either). This is really ugly. There is some way - I managed to do this one time before - same issue - and after enough searching - there is a way to get it out of there - but it's not easy or obvious!
arghhh

[#12]

This is an adoption blocker for me. It's such a time waster and issue generator that I'd rather use private mode than having to switch logins all the time.

[#13]

This is probably my #1 dislike about Edge at the moment - not being able to remove the "Connected to Windows".

[#14]

I almost forgot about this issue since I installed the Edge Addon called “Use My Current Account”. It uses the account that is logged in to the browser profile. You can easily disable it if you want to choose account again. No affiliation, just a great little Addon.
https://microsoftedge.microsoft.com/addons/detail/use-my-current-account/hbfacnnpimgddoojjaonnnbelje...

[#15]

@TomAafloen - Thank you so much for recommending this extension! It completely solves the issue in this thread.

[#16]

@josh_bodner Do you have any news on this 2-year old topic? Will this ever be resolved? I, too, use a separate profile to manage M365 and Azure with a different user account and it is really annoying being asked 30 times a day, what account I want to use to sign into Azure. When it really should just use the one account, I already signed in with in the morning.

The "Connected to Windows" account needs to have an opt-out! Otherwise this browser is not doing the job, I set it up to do. Meaning, I will just switch to a different one altogether.

[#17]

Is there any update to this issue after two years?

I have a daily user account with limited administrative access that I have signed into the computer, and when I go to use Edge for admin work within O365/Azure/EAC, I am constantly having to switch profiles due to Edge being "smart" and noticing that I'm navigating to a Microsoft login page, and "helpfully" signing me in with my Connected to Windows account. This has led to countless redirect loops when attempting to access the Exchange Admin Center, specifically, due to the lack of permissions on my standard, non-admin level account. The loop order is as follows:

1. Bookmark link: https://admin.exchange.microsoft.com/
2. Edge loads page and signs in with non-admin account that is "Connected to Windows"
3. Redirected to https://outlook.office365.com/ecp/ as the EAC portal must notice that the account does not have permissions to sign in
4. Immediate redirected to https://admin.exchange.microsoft.com/?landingpage=homepage&form=ecp_toggle_redirect
5. Redirected back to https://admin.exchange.microsoft.com/
6. Repeat every 2-3 seconds

I don't want to remove the account from the OS via Settings > Accounts > Access Work or School, as this is my company account on my assigned company device. I would prefer to use Edge for this case due to mental compartmentalization and personal work flow, but if this can't be addressed I will simply use Firefox, Brave, or another browser with more granular control.

The profile signed into Edge is the Admin level account, and I've attempted to remove the associated passwords to the portals in question multiple times. From what I can tell, this is caused by Microsoft's Sign In Assistant, and it's all or nothing with no way to opt out of Edge specifically.

Hopefully, Microsoft has been working on and plans to implement a feature of removing, or at least not defaulting & overriding the user-specified default account, the 'Connected To Windows' Microsoft account from the list of sign in options displayed when using Edge browser to navigate to Microsoft Cloud sign in pages, such as the Azure Portal and the Exchange Admin Center. Having it available as a secondary option is nice, but not necessary.

Thank you for your time.

[#18]

This is now happening in Chrome as well all of a sudden. I used to just use Edge as my 365 account, and any of my clients that I need to access, I would login through Chrome. Now, it's doing it for both browsers. Very annoying!

[#19]

@tboggsAgree and have more to add to this problem. I'm an independent IT consultant, with admin rights to many M365/Azure tenants, limited admin rights to some -- and a personal M365 account.

When I try to log in to one of my TENANT accounts where I'm a partial (not global) admin (and only for this one), the login screen switches to my personal account, and I have to "use other account."

I'm willing to do the dance, but I think it's what's breaking my ability to use Bookings with my tenant's account (where I am trying to publish my availability). Bookings breaks whenever I try to create a shared Bookings page (I get an 'ugh-oh' error, which is not idiomatic, but that's a different problem...).

The tenant in question is "Connected to Windows" and I am unable to disconnect it.

In an attempt to dissociate my personal M365 account from this "problem" client tenant account, I have

- removed the personal account from 'accounts'

- renamed it

- removed the 'problem' email address from my personal account and made another one primary (and sole)

- signed out everywhere from the tenant account

- rebooted

IDK whether I have to hack the registry or get an AAD admin on the tenant to un-manage my PC.

It's a royal PITA.

[#20]

Hi,

My original setup was an AD hybrid joined device and I had no problems like this.
My new setup is one with an AAD only device linked to my AAD account, and both Edge and Firefox make use of the 'connected to windows' account by kindly logging me into each SSO session with that account.

Edge and Firefox were both used to maintain separation between tenant accounts, the same as @knyhus.

To resolve the issue of having the windows account auto login, the best solution I have found is below. It stops the SSO login and the presentation of credentials for the 'connected to windows account' during the creation of each profile in Edge. I am unsure of the effect on profiles that were configured before this change (I had deleted all mine in anger and swore off ever using Edge again!).

For firefox, in 'about:config', set the 'network.http.windows-sso.enabled' to false.
It disables SSO but does allow for individual container tabs to be logged in with the chosen account, instead of having the SSO login, logout and change chore.

For Edge, with reference to [https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/deployedge/microsoft-edge-policies#nonremovableprofileenabled] (accessed 2023-03-04), the following registry entry was added:
HKCU:/Software/Microsoft/Policies/Edge
NonRemovableProfileEnabled = DWORD:0x00000000

Effect as above; it prevents the 'connected to windows' account from auto-logging in.

Best wishes.

Roy