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I am aware that there is already a similar question but that is more than 7 years old, am I am using Windows 10 now.

My intention was to block any communication of Steam and Steam Web Helper via network and I changed the firewall settings as follows:

  • Steam (InBound) - removed all existing rules and defined a single rule "blocked" which was valid for "All Profiles", any local/remote addresses, all protocols and set this rule active.
  • Steam (OutBound) - same settings

So far so good. My next inspection of the firewall settings gave me a surprise: I found additional rules which were also active AND gave Steam and Steam Web Helper ALL permissions to communicate. I suspect that Steam had installed the new firewall rules and it could do so since Steam requires admin privileges to run.

Is there a way to prevent Steam to communicate (except pulling the network plug)?

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  • Meanwhile, I have found the same question in this forum link and this question does already have an answer which recommends to use the Windows Host File to redirect any requests to my local machine but this would mean to add some hundred addresses to that table - and Steam might add addresses anytime. I guess there is no way to prevent an application with admin privileges to change or add firewall rules. Jun 18, 2018 at 16:12
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    What is your goal? Why do you want to block Steam? That is prety counter to the whole purpose of having Steam in the first place. Why not just uninstall Steam?
    – EBGreen
    Jun 18, 2018 at 17:34
  • Did you try putting it in offline mode?
    – cybernard
    Jun 18, 2018 at 19:41
  • Unfortunately, my game "TrainSimulator" (and many more games, I guess) require access control via Steam. Since I am only interested in running my game I do not need any of the features of Steam except as launcher for the TrainSimulator. Indeed, Steam offers an "offline" mode which I had activated. But Steam keeps communicating even in offline mode and that is something I do not want to allow. Jun 19, 2018 at 11:26

1 Answer 1

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Yes, I found a method to block Steam from communication AND from defining its own firewall rules: Just modified the firewall rules which had been defined by Steam but restricted these rules to the local principal "System". Steam can no longer communicate now but still believes that the rules do not need to be replaced.

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  • This doesn't work. Steam recreates the rule anyway.
    – user624722
    Oct 15, 2020 at 16:57

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