Deselect “automatically detect settings” in IE using GPP

Lately I struggled with finding a way to deselect “automatically detect settings” in IE for all users of a customer.

There are no GPO settings for this and the GPP IE settings doesn’t allow to set this for any IE versions before IE10 and the customer needs IE9 for compatibility issues with their SharePoint sites.

After much searching I found a way to set this  using GPP to set a registry setting.

1. Create a new GPO or edit an existing one
2. Navigate to User configuration – Preferences – Windows Settings – Registry
3. Create a new registry item with the following values
   1. Name: DefaultConnectionSettings
   2. Action: Update
   3. Hive: HKEY_CURRENT_USER
   4. Path: Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings\Connections
   5. Value Name: DefaultConnectionSettings
   6. Type: REG_BINARY
   7. Data: (make sure you copy the entire line below, it’s several hundred digits)

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

It should look like this then

This will always clear the “Automatically detect settings” on next logon or gpupdate