Server 2012 – Set Proxy Server and Prevent Changes via Group Policy

Thanks to Microsoft, with the removal of the Internet Explorer Maintenance section in Group Policy since IE9, once again they’ve decided to make things more complicated and the end users have lost yet another important administrative tool required for many environments.

That being said, the only way to set and enforce proxy settings in Internet Explorer now requires hacking the registry, which I’m seeing as a disturbingly all too common trend when setting up an RDS server. Here are the keys to the kingdom:

User Configuration > Preferences > Windows Settings > Registry

Right-click Registry > New > Registry-Item

These are required entries…

Action: Update
Hive: HKEY_CURRENT_USER
Key Path: Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings
Value name: MigrateProxy
Value type: REG_DWORD
Value data: 1
Base: Decimal

Action: Update
Hive: HKEY_CURRENT_USER
Key Path: Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings
Value name: ProxyEnable
Value type: REG_DWORD
Value data: 1
Base: Decimal

Action: Update
Hive: HKEY_CURRENT_USER
Key Path: Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings
Value name: ProxyHttp1.1
Value type: REG_DWORD
Value data: 0
Base: Decimal

Set you proxy server’s address and port number here…

Action: Update
Hive: HKEY_CURRENT_USER
Key Path: Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings
Value name: ProxyServer
Value type: REG_SZ
Value data: YourProxyServerAddress:Port

Set any sites that you wish to bypass the proxy server here. If you want to use single sign-on for your Exchange server, you would need to enter that here or if you want to enable access to all local intranet sites, enter <local>…

Action: Update
Hive: HKEY_CURRENT_USER
Key Path: Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings
Value name: ProxyOverride
Value type: REG_SZ
Value data: YourExchangeServersFQDN;<local>

And most importantly, to disable changes to the Proxy Settings on the Connections tab in Internet Options, add this key…

Action: Update
Hive: HKEY_CURRENT_USER
Key Path: Software\Policies\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Control Panel
Value name: Proxy
Value type: REG_DWORD
Value data: 1
Base: Decimal

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