Microsoft is looking into "unbelievable" fake Edge download pop-up

Microsoft is working very hard at developing its new Edge browser, but the prospect of massively increasing their market share to challenge the Google Chrome browser seems well out of reach.

The company has become increasingly desperate in their advertising of their browser including what one user called an “unbelievable” fake pop-up on Bing when you search for an alternative browser.

The banner is designed to resemble the usual appearance of the file download UI after clicking a file download link, suggesting Microsoft is once again engaging in the rather unethical Dark Patterns which trick users into thinking they have no choice but to follow Microsoft’s suggestion and download the browser, if only to make the pop-up go away.

This frankly resembles the behaviour of malware ads, and Microsoft has now responded to critics by saying they will be talking to the marketing team, saying on the Edge Insider support pages:

Re: “Get the New Microsoft Edge” Popups
@tomscharbach Thank you for bringing this to our attention here. We’re really sorry to hear that these notifications are compromising your browsing, especially while using Microsoft Edge! This is certainly not the experience that we’re aiming to provide, and we take reports like this seriously, especially when coming from one of our long-time Insiders.

We do work closely with the Marketing team, so I will pass this along to them. In the meantime, it would be helpful if you and any others who see this can submit feedback and diagnostic data through the browser.

What do our readers think of Microsoft’s latest Edge advertising strategy? Let us know below.

via Techdows