I ran across a couple of local programs that access a copy of “msedgewebview2” runtime to gain access to the net. One of them uses a version stored in the "C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft\EdgeWebView" path, but the other program has it’s own copy in its application folder under Program Files at “C:\Program Files\SINE Player\BrowserRuntime”. Both are signed by Microsoft, but are different versions.
I did some checking, and this executable is NOT the MS Edge browser itself, but rather is a runtime method for a web aware application to connect to the network. So it apparently is a Microsoft method for a 3rd party application to be web enabled internally, for example so it can access a proprietary in-app store. I contacted the tech support for one application, and they confirmed that’s how it is supposed to work.
I had to set firewall policies to block each of them (as I am not comfy with a program getting net access using this method), but that did not affect the MS Edge browser itself, which is a good thing… Edge has its own executable and firewall policy (allowed here).
The Microsoft Edge WebView2 control allows you to embed web technologies (HTML, CSS, and JavaScript) in your native apps. The WebView2 control uses Microsoft Edge as the rendering engine to display the web content in native apps.
With WebView2, you can embed web code in different parts of your native app, or build all of the native app within a single WebView instance.