A critical remote code execution vulnerability found in the AI-upgraded Windows 11 Notepad has fueled renewed criticism of Microsoft's forced AI feature creep.

The dangerous CVE-2026-20841 vulnerability in Windows 11 Notepad proves once again that basic applications do not need advanced features.

Microsoft confirms CVE-2026-20841, a Remote Code Execution flaw in Windows 11 Notepad via Markdown links. Patch now rolling out.

Notepad has lately fallen out of favor with a lot of Windows users. I stumbled on a new open-source alternative that you might enjoy instead.

Who isn't by now?

High-severity flaw fixed in Windows 11 Notepad ...

There's a difference between the "Notepad app" and notepad.exe. The Notepad app has the AI and all the new stuff in it. But the old C : \windows\system32\notepad.exe still exists, and is unencumbered ...

Infrastructure delivering updates for Notepad++—a widely used text editor for Windows—was compromised for six months by ...

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