Desktop (explorer.exe) always connected to Microsoft

explorer.exe is a file browser, not a web browser.

Can you post a picture of what you mean?

Explorer connects to internet to verify digital signatures, when you are installing something.
But I believe, that you are refering to msnbot-191-232-139-135.search.msn.com ?
It is bingbot, you can verify it here: Bing - Verify Bingbot Tool

bingbot - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Mystere said:

Cortana and Desktop search are both built-in to explorer. So these stay connected to use the web services.

That might be what they tell you or what you might assume but the thing is.... It connects to MSNBOT even if you have Cortana and internet search disabled.

Basically its not for search even tho its MSNBOT .. its collecting data on the files you have on your system and how you use them. You can't get rid of this connection. Even if you block Explorer from inbound and outbound "Public" which should keep it from accessing the internet, it will still connect.

The only way I see to block it is to make a rule to keep Explorer from accessing "Public, Domain and Private" but doing this will keep you from doing some things over your local network. I guess the only way to rid yourself of this blatant violation of users privacy is to use the HOSTS file to direct all MSNBOT addresses to 0.0.0.0. You wont be able to use bing or Cortana anymore but .... who in their right mind uses bing anyway... it is one of the worst search engines out there. LOL they are too busy collecting information about their users to actually make the searches relevant and Cortana is just signing away all your privacy to MS if you choose to use that according to their EULA. Personal Assistants like GoogleNow and Seri are bad but MS has upped the game with Cortana... It is the worst.. collecting data all the time... always recording your conversations and sending them to MS even if you aren't talking to / using Cortana at the moment.... But I guess for convenience, people are wiling to totally give away any privacy they still have left in this world.

The problem is most people are not informed. They use stuff like cloud based services and these assistants and don't even realize that anything they do with these services is available for anyone in the world to view and monitor ... usually its just the company that is giving out the "cloud service" that is monitoring you but since its "the cloud" its online and its available for any and all hackers also. The funniest thing I have seen lately is companies selling "security" IP cameras that are cloud based. I mean lol .. isn't that an oxymoron. Lets hook up security so that the company and any hacker/thieves can have full view of my house and everything that is happening in and around it.

With the amount of security holes and data collection Microsoft has implemented in 10 (windows 8 was bad but 10 is exponentially worse) ... I think its time to move to Linux and only boot Windows if I want to play a game... The only good thing about MS doing this with 10 is that Linux will now become more popular and the software devs will have to start focusing more on that OS (lack of dev support is the reason Linux hasn't taken over Windows as the most popular OS)... Windows is on its way out if they keep this crap up.. and the more data mining they do.. the more popular Linux will become and the devs will have to start programming for that which will make Linux even better and further kill Windows.

Windows needs to announce a patch and make it very public. This patch needs to state that they are eliminating all the mining unless you "opt-in" and have it set to actually have the ability to 'opt-in' ... not this crap where its pre-enabled and even turning it off doesn't stop it. If they don't do this ... they will lose a lot of people to Linux. I can only assume that MS is counting on the fact that most users are totally computer illiterate and do not pay attention to the news or the internet. Unfortunately for those of us who understand the future implications of continuing to allow this, we can just sit back and watch as everyone looses all privacy and foolishly accepts it.

Too many people have the attitude of "Well, I don't do anything wrong so I have nothing to worry about." What these people don't seem to understand is, the deterioration of privacy and freedom is gradual and eventually you are going to get to the point where you will have to wear a camera 24/7 so everything you do can be monitored. Just go back 20 years... People back then would have freaked out if they found out that the government was taping all phones and allowing 'search and seizure' without a warrant but since the media created fear and too many people having the "i don't do anything wrong" attitude... we have lost some major freedoms. Giving MS full access to your life because "hey I'm not doing anything wrong" is just the start.. allowing this with no resistance will just allow them to push more... until ... camera for 24/7 monitoring.

As an update:
I tried adding the offending addresses to my host file. Funny thing is.... I try to ping the address and it says its not a good address so the host file is working but ... check my monitoring program and the addy I added is connected to Explorer.exe and even if I kill it it just comes right back... connects fully established. Seems that Microsoft has figured out that people are blocking their efforts and has made it so their spying can bypass the host file.

I did block all incoming and outgoing traffic for Explorer and then killed the connection and it would try to connect but wouldn't establish. So far, I have not found any problems accessing my network drives or even my personal cloud (open source... not SpyDrive) with Explorer so I guess blocking all access with your firewall is the way to go.