Windows 11's latest update quietly ends support for picture passwords
Microsoft's latest Windows update has removed support for picture passwords, a feature introduced in Windows 8. The change affects both Windows 10 and Windows 11, but only for new enrollments, as existing picture passwords will continue to work. Microsoft recommends using biometrics, PINs, or Windows Hello as more secure alternatives to picture passwords.
- ▪The KB5101650 update, released on July 14, 2026, has disabled support for picture passwords on Windows 10 and Windows 11.
- ▪Existing picture passwords will continue to work, but users will no longer be able to configure new ones after changing or removing their existing sign-in method.
- ▪Microsoft recommends using biometrics, PINs, or Windows Hello as more secure alternatives to picture passwords.
TechSpot files mainly under tech. We currently carry 395 of its stories.
Story provenance
Source · retrieval · rights · ranking — open for full record
inspect →
Story provenance
Attribution is not the same as permission. This drawer separates discovery metadata, excerpts, WeSearch-generated summaries, reuse status, and whether the publisher receives the visit. Nothing here claims a legal grant the publisher has not made.
Record
| Original publisher | TechSpot |
| Canonical URL | https://www.techspot.com/news/113440-microsoft-removing-picture-password-support-windows.html |
| Publication time | Tue, 11 Aug 2026 17:16 -0500 |
| Retrieval time | 2026-08-11T22:20:44.399Z |
| Last seen | 2026-08-11T22:20:44.399Z |
| Headline source | Publisher (no WeSearch rewrite) |
| Excerpt source | publisher body |
| Excerpt method | First ~120 words (~800 chars) of extracted publisher body, fair-use limited. |
| Summary | WeSearch · cerebras-chat (WeSearch summarizer) |
| Summary source text | contentText |
| Citation coverage | Summary is a WeSearch-generated derivative; primary citation is the original publisher URL. |
| Cluster | tJSTDqFOmC4C · 1 stories |
| Cluster logic | Grouped by semantic title/content similarity across sources within a rolling window. Same-publisher template collisions are excluded from coverage comparison. |
| Ranking reason | Story pages are not engagement-ranked. Hub feeds use recency, with optional source-diversified chronological ordering (cap consecutive stories per source). No personalized ranking. |
| Publisher visit | Yes — open original |
| Substitutes article? | No — link-out required for full text |
Rights status (four layers)
WeSearch handling by dimension
| Indexing | May the item be indexed (stored, ranked, made findable)? | Allowed |
| Snippet | May a short excerpt of the publisher's text be shown? | Allowed |
| AI summary | May WeSearch generate its own short summary of the article? | Limited |
| Retrieval / RAG | May the content be exposed for third-party retrieval-augmented generation? | Not asserted |
| Model training | May the content be used to train AI models? | Not asserted |
| Commercial reuse | May the content be reused commercially? | Not permitted |
Basis: Derived from the published RSS/Atom feed. Contact: [email protected]. Reviewed: 2026-07-24.
Opening excerpt (first ~120 words) tap to expand
Security Microsoft windows password Windows 11's latest update quietly ends support for picture passwords The change affects both Windows 10 and Windows 11, but only for new enrollments By Alfonso Maruccia August 11, 2026, 17:16 Add TechSpot Serving tech enthusiasts for over 25 years. TechSpot means tech analysis and advice you can trust. Faces Matter: Microsoft introduced the picture password security feature with Windows 8, but the aging authentication method is now on its way out. Drawing a few lines around a personal photo was never considered a particularly secure authentication method anyway, which is why Microsoft is now recommending biometrics as an alternative.
…
Excerpt limited to ~120 words for fair-use compliance. The full article is at TechSpot.
Discussion
0 commentsMore from TechSpot
