Good news Flash lovers! Microsoft won't be disabling it by default (so long as you use IE or old Edge)

Hey Flash fans! Microsoft has fiddled with its plans to join the platoon of vendors aiming to make Adobe's Swiss-Cheese-alike plug-in just a horrid memory by 2020.

Adobe has already announced the end of support in 2020 for the multimedia component, beloved by Internet cartoon makers years ago and hackers for, well, pretty much ever. Back in 2017, Google said it would be killing the thing off in the same time frame, with Chrome initially prompting users for sites that insisted on sticking with the tech before stripping it completely from the browser by the end of 2020.

With Microsoft's new Edge browser being based on Chromium, it is of little surprise that its shiny new toy would follow suit.

As with Chrome, Flash will need to be enabled on a site by site basis for Chromium Edge with the default being "hell no, Adobe." Mindful of enterprises still clinging to the dwindling number of sites that require the technology, admins can use Group Policies to control how Flash support works ahead of that 2020 removal.

Things are a little different for the old Edge (built on EdgeHTML) and Internet Explorer 11. The gang does not plan to update either browser to disable Flash by default. After all, hardly anyone uses Old Edge and Microsoft has been extremely vocal in its desire for users to let Internet Explorer rest in peace. However, Flash will still be fully removed from both legacy browsers by December 2020 as planned.

The company had originally stated, as part of the communal stabbing-in-the-back of the unloved (by security pros at least) component, that Flash would by disabled by default in both IE and Edge (as it was back then) by mid to late 2019.

We've asked Microsoft why the change of plans (cough-Chromium-cough), and will update if we get a response.

Of course, while Old Edge will likely be put out to pasture itself next year, once Chromium Edge is unleashed on the public, Internet Explorer will live on, as a special type of tab in the new browser for those enterprises that simply cannot let those old web applications go. ®