Windows 10 Pro: "Cortana is disabled by company policy"

Question

..And I think I know why. Early on, I bought into the "Windows 10 is spyware!!" meme and ran some random tool that apparently damaged various parts of my system.

I'm now trying to get those damaged bits back, starting with Cortana.

Clicking on the taskbar search icon and clicking on the gear brings me to a screen that says "Cortana is disabled by company policy". Some reading digs up a few things that would lead to the feature being disabled, but I've checked them all:

• A group policy administrative template that disables Cortana. This is set as "not configured".

• A registry hack, under HKLM/SOFTWARE/Policies/Microsoft/Windows/Windows Search that would place an AllowCortana = 0 key. No such key exists.

• Having the incorrect language files installed. All I have is English, and I am in the USA and on the English locale.

• Having telemetry turned off - I'm in the insider program, so it's set to Full for me.

For giggles, I did a sfc /scannow, and of course, nothing was found.

How do I undo whatever damage this tool did to my system, and get Cortana back?

Answer 1

1. Make sure you don't have any exchange accounts set up with Outlook.
2. Run this powershell script.

Done.

# Needs to run as administrator
If ( -not ([Security.Principal.WindowsPrincipal][Security.Principal.WindowsIdentity]::GetCurrent()).IsInRole([Security.Principal.WindowsBuiltInRole] "Administrator"))
{
    $arguments = "& '" + $myinvocation.mycommand.definition + "'"
        Start-Process powershell -Verb runAs -ArgumentList $arguments
        Break
}

# Installs cortana (and friends)

Get-AppXPackage -AllUsers | ForEach { Add-AppXPackage -DisableDevelopmentMode -Register "$($_.InstallLocation)\AppXManifest.xml" }

# Set registry keys properly
# taken from `http://stackoverflow.com/a/5652674/850326`
Function Test-RegistryValue {
    param(
        [Alias("PSPath")]
        [Parameter(Position = 0, Mandatory = $true, ValueFromPipeline = $true, ValueFromPipelineByPropertyName = $true)]
        [String]$Path
        ,
        [Parameter(Position = 1, Mandatory = $true)]
        [String]$Name
        ,
        [Switch]$PassThru
    )

    process {
        if (Test-Path $Path) {
            $Key = Get-Item -LiteralPath $Path
            if ($Key.GetValue($Name, $null) -ne $null) {
                if ($PassThru) {
                    Get-ItemProperty $Path $Name
                } else {
                    $true
                }
            } else {
                $false
            }
        } else {
            $false
        }
    }
}

Function Set-RegistryValue {
    param(
        [Parameter(Position = 0, Mandatory = $true, ValueFromPipeline = $true, ValueFromPipelineByPropertyName = $true)]
        [String]$Path
        ,
        [Parameter(Position = 1, Mandatory = $true)]
        [String]$Name
        ,
        [Parameter(Position = 2, Mandatory = $true)]
        [String]$Value
    )

    If (-not (Test-Path $Path))
    {
        New-Item -Path "$Path" -Force | Out-Null

    }

    if (-not (Test-RegistryValue -Path "$Path" -Name "$Name"))
    {
        New-ItemProperty -Path "$Path" -Name "$Name" -Value "$Value"
    }
    else
    {
        Set-ItemProperty -Path "$Path" -Name "$Name" -Value "$Value"
    }
}

# Fix allow cortana key

$allowCortanaPath = "Microsoft.PowerShell.Core\Registry::HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\Windows Search"
$allowCortanaName = "AllowCortana"
$allowCortanaValue = "1"

Set-RegistryValue -Path "$allowCortanaPath" -Name "$allowCortanaName" -Value "$allowCortanaValue"

# Fix allow telemetry key

$allowTelemetryPath = "Microsoft.PowerShell.Core\Registry::HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Policies\Microsoft\Windows\DataCollection"
$allowTelemetryName = "AllowTelemetry"
# The following value sets "AllowTelemetry" to "Full"
$allowTelemetryValue = "3"

Set-RegistryValue -Path "$allowTelemetryPath" -Name "$allowTelemetryName" -Value "$allowTelemetryValue"

# Restart explorer to see changes

Stop-Process -name explorer