Microsoft appears to be ramping up its efforts to push its Bing search engine, with The Verge (rightfully) likening the company’s tactics to malware.

The Verge’s Tom Warren describes Microsoft’s latest tactics, which involve randomly displaying a pop-up over other applications, even to the point of interrupting a gaming session to display it:

I thought I had malware on my main Windows 11 machine this weekend. There I was minding my own business in Chrome before tabbing back to a game and wham a pop-up appeared asking me to switch my default search engine to Microsoft Bing in Chrome. Stunningly, Microsoft now thinks it’s ok to shove a pop-up in my face above my apps and games just because I dare to use Chrome instead of Microsoft Edge.

As Warren points out, the pop-up does not originate in the notification center, nor is it the standard pop-up that highlights new features. Instead, it is a standalone executable in c:\windows\temp\mubstemp, and is signed by Microsoft.

“We are aware of these reports and have paused this notification while we investigate and take appropriate action to address this unintended behavior,” Caitlin Roulston, director of communications, told The Verge.

This is not the first time Microsoft has drawn the ire of users in recent years over its aggressive efforts to push Edge and Bing. The company’s tactics have become decidedly reminiscent of the tactics that led to the US government’s groundbreaking antitrust case against the company.

As Warren points out, Microsoft has no doubt covered itself legally with the plethora of incredibly long license agreements it presents to users. Nonetheless, such tactics are underhanded at best and unethical at worst.

Over the last decade, Microsoft Windows’ market share has steadily dropped from 91.5% in August 2012 to 69.5% in July 2023. If Windows’ market share continues to decline, Microsoft will have only itself — and its malware-style marketing tactics — to blame.