Privacy and Security Exclude a Website from Recall Snapshots in Windows 11

This tutorial will show you how to add or remove websites to filter out of your Recall snapshots for your account in Windows 11.

Starting with Windows 11 build 26120.2415 (Dev) on Snapdragon-powered Copilot+ PCs, you can try out the Recall (Preview) feature.

Starting with Windows 11 build 26120.2510 (Dev), Microsoft is expanding the preview of Recall to Windows Insiders on AMD and Intel-powered Copilot+ PCs.

Recall was introduced earlier this year, with the ability to enable you to quickly find and jump back into what you have seen before on your PC. You can use an explorable timeline to find the content you remember seeing before. You can also use semantic powered search and just describe how you remember something and Recall will retrieve the moment you saw it. Any photo, link, or message can be a fresh point to continue from.

To use Recall you need to opt in to saving snapshots, which are screenshots of your activity. Snapshots and the contextual information derived from them are saved and encrypted to your local hard drive. Recall does not share snapshots or associated data with Microsoft or third parties, nor is it shared between different Windows users on the same device. Windows will ask for your permission before saving snapshots. You are always in control, and you can delete snapshots, pause or turn them off at any time. Any future options for the user to share data will require fully informed explicit action by the user.

You're always in control of what's saved as a snapshot. You can disable saving snapshots, pause temporarily, filter apps and websites, and delete your snapshots at any time.

To help maintain your privacy, Recall processes your content locally on the Copilot+ PC and securely stores it only on your device. Snapshots are encrypted by Device Encryption or BitLocker, which are enabled by default on Windows 11. Recall doesn't share snapshots with other users that are signed into Windows on the same device. Microsoft can't access or view the snapshots.

You can choose how long snapshots can be saved on your device. In the Maximum storage duration for snapshots setting, select either 30, 60, 90, 180 days, or unlimited. Once snapshots reach the age limit, they are deleted from the device. If you don’t set the maximum storage duration, then snapshots aren’t deleted until the Maximum storage for snapshots limit is reached, and then the oldest snapshots are deleted first.

You can select which websites you want to exclude, such as banking websites. You will need to use a supported browser for Recall to filter websites and to automatically filter private browsing activity. Supported browsers, and their capabilities include:

• Microsoft Edge: blocks websites and filters private browsing activity
• Firefox: blocks websites and filters private browsing activity
• Opera: blocks websites and filters private browsing activity
• Google Chrome: blocks websites and filters private browsing activity
• Chromium based browsers: For Chromium-based browsers not listed above, filters private browsing activity only, doesn’t block specific websites

If Recall gets launched, or the Now option is selected in Recall, then a snapshot is taken even when InPrivate windows, blocked apps, and blocked websites are displayed. However, these snapshots are not saved by Recall. If you choose to send the information from this snapshot to another app, a temp file will also be created in C:\Users\[username]\AppData\Local\Temp to share the content. The temporary file is deleted once the content is transferred over the app you selected to use.

Starting with Windows 11 build 26120.3281 (Dev 24H2), Recall filtering options are now easily accessible via the Recall system tray flyout instead of having to set filtering directly in Settings.

References:

Recall (Preview) will begin to rollout on Snapdragon-powered Copilot+ PCs, with support for AMD and Intel-powered Copilot+ PCs coming soon. As we gradually roll out Recall in preview, Recall is supported on select languages including Chinese (simplified), English, French, German, Japanese, and Spanish. Content-based and storage limitations apply. See here for more details. Recall is not yet available in all regions, with expanded availability coming over time.

1 Open Quick Settings (Win+A), and click/tap on the Recall button. (see screenshot below)


2 Click/tap on the Add or Remove button for the current site. (see screenshots below)







1 Open Settings (Win+I).

2 Click/tap on Privacy & security on the left side, and click/tap on Recall & snapshots on the right side under "Windows permissions". (see screenshot below)


3 Do step 4 (add) or step 5 (remove) below for what you want.














6 If prompted by Windows Security, click/tap on OK to approve. (see screenshot below)


7 When finished adding or removing websites for the filter list, you can close Settings if you like.


That's it,
Shawn Brink