Microsoft has released an out-of-band update, Windows 11 KB5070773, to fix a broken Windows Recovery Environment (WinRE) caused by the previous update, KB5066835.
The issue arose after the October 2025 Patch Tuesday update, which installed automatically for Windows 11 24H2/25H2 versions. Tests confirmed that the keyboard and mouse no longer work in WinRE, making the recovery process unusable.
Microsoft used server-side updates to quickly reverse changes that broke localhost, but the second problem, which breaks Windows Recovery Environment (WinRE), cannot be rolled back via server-side changes.
The new update, KB5070773, is designed to address this issue and restore functionality to the Windows Recovery Environment.
Author's summary: Windows 11 emergency update fixes recovery failure.