How do I disable "Microsoft Word Security Notice" pop-up

Anonymous
2021-07-07T17:12:32+00:00

I am extremely frustrated, to the point that I want to just switch over to Apple products the way everyone tells me to.

For no reason - (at least nothing I did), Microsoft appears to have installed some type of software on my computer that whenever I copy and paste into a MS Word document, I get an annoying pop-up:

Microsoft Word Security Notice

Microsoft Office has identified a potential security concern.

This document contains fields that can share data with external files and websites. It is important that this file is from a trustworthy source.

Choosing Yes will enable updating all fields in this file until you close it.

And I say --- duh! This is what I was trying to do. But why do I have to be annoyed each and every time I do anything with MS Word products??? Oh.. I'm using Windows 10 Professional and a Microsoft 365 account through my school

How can I fix it? Or should I just throw this Dell Latitude Laptop out the window and start over with an iBook?

Arrrrrgh.

****@*****.***.edu

Microsoft 365 and Office | Word | For home | Windows

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Jay Freedman 208.2K Reputation points Volunteer Moderator
2021-07-08T15:04:48+00:00

I'm not sure if this is a bug or a security feature which was enabled after the last update. Is there a way to disable this warning when doing mail merges?

It is a bug in the last update, and it is what Microsoft's team is working to resolve. When the fix is released, the security notice should not pop up when it isn't appropriate, i.e., during a merge or after pasting a benign object from another location. Until that fix arrives, though, the rollback that you did is the only way to avoid the notices.

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Anonymous
2021-07-16T06:16:21+00:00

I just updated my MS Office and this problem has been solved.

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  1. Anonymous
    2021-09-24T10:14:22+00:00

    Neil Sargent - Smart IT, Thanks for this helpful information. I will give it a try. However, with close to 1,000 documents used daily for our mail merge this would be a HUGE undertaking to update all the fields and images in each document. So, roll back to the previous version, which we have done, is the best solution for us, at this time.

    Also, I recognize that Windows 11 is coming soon\October, and that is likely going to mess things up further. I hope they find a resolution before then.

    FYI: I my secondary machine which has the latest Windows and Office 365 versions STILL has this problem.

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  2. Anonymous
    2021-09-24T10:01:12+00:00

    My clients have started reporting this issue this week with their mail merge operations. I have found a workaround which will keep us going while Microsoft work on a fix.

    In our case the cause is the use of INCLUDETEXT and INCLUDEPICTURE fields. The fields should be fine if the path to the included document or picture is in a trusted location. Due to this latest bug, the security warning is being issued when the field is unlocked, even though the included item is in a trusted location.

    I have been able to avoid the problem by replacing the directly {INCLUDETEXT} field with the included content. This can be done by manually unlocking the field (highlight the field and press Ctrl-Shift-F9).

    I hope this can help some users as a workaround

    Neil Sargent

    Smart IT Ltd.

    www.smartit.ltd.uk

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  3. Anonymous
    2021-09-16T13:01:48+00:00

    Tonnisa,

    I have read solutions like this before, but fooling around with the registry is way above my pay grade, and can lead to other problems with your system, so respectfully I will say no thank you. [Smile]

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