Here’s how to try Microsoft Edge’s “Super Duper Safe Mode”

Microsoft wants you to use Edge. In an attempt to attract the most security-conscious users, the company is testing a new “Super Duper Secure Mode”. No, it’s not a name we made up; that’s what Microsoft calls this new browser mode in Edge, at least for now.

What is “Super Duper Secure Mode?”

Microsoft’s “Super Duper Safe Mode” is being tested with the Edge Vulnerability Research team, as first spotted by BleepingComputer. The general idea of ​​the navigation mode is to provide security improvements without significant performance degradation. Ideally, the business would be able to create a locked-down browsing experience without creating slowdowns or bottlenecks.

The new browser mode removes just-in-time (JIT) compilation from the V8 processing pipeline, which is designed to reduce the attack surface that threat actors can use to hijack Edge.

To put it even more simply, browser mode removes a method that hackers could use to hijack a browsing session.

At the moment, we are disabling JIT and enabling CET in the rendering process. Activating ACG is next after we’ve done some testing. We also have plans for Android and Mac. Android being the most interesting since the mobile is such a key target 6 /?

– Johnathan Norman (@spoofyroot) August 4, 2021

Johnathan Norman, Microsoft Edge Vulnerability Research Lead, has broken browsing mode on GitHub. “This reduction in the attack surface has the potential to dramatically improve user security; this would remove about half of the bugs in the V8 that need to be fixed.

The reason JIT exists is to speed things up by compiling code while the program is running, but Microsoft says disabling it doesn’t always have a negative impact on performance.

Not only does the mode turn off JIT, it also turns on Application Control Flow Technology (CET), which is Intel hardware-based exploit mitigation that helps further lock down the browsing experience.

Eventually, Microsoft plans to add Arbitrary Code Guard (ACG) to mode, which is another mitigation tool that prevents malicious code from being loaded into memory.

Unfortunately, the name won’t stick if Microsoft decides to implement the mode in Edge permanently. “Also, our tongue-in-cheek name will probably have to change to something more professional when we launch a feature. For now, we’re going to keep having fun with it, ”Norman concluded.

How to try the “Super Duper Secure” mode yourself

If you feel you are interested in Super Duper Secure, trying out the mode is relatively straightforward. First, you need to make sure that you are running one of the pre-release versions of Microsoft Edge (i.e. Beta, Dev, or Canary).

As long as you have one installed, simply type the following into your Edge address bar and enable the new browser mode:

edge://flags/#edge-enable-super-duper-secure-mode

While you shouldn’t see any noticeable drops in performance (according to Microsoft), this is still an experimental mode and some issues might arise, so give it a try for yourself and see what happens.