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Evan Omo · 2006/11/09

Hello all,
I have a question. If you visit a website sometimes there will be advertisments and if you click on them they will take you to a bad website. For example there will be an ad saying you won a free ringtone. If you click on the ad you will be taken to a bad website where it will ask you to enter your e-mail address and so on. My point is these ads are very annoying and I would like to know if there is any way to not display ads in wepages. I heard that you can do this in Firefox I believe but can you block Ads in IE? I am using Windows XP Service Pack 2 with Internet Explorer 7 and McAfee Siteadvisor installed. Any suggesstions would be greatly appreciated.

Welshjim · 2006/11/10

Evan Omo--One way would be to create a HOSTS file and then populate it with the sites offered in this reference.
http://www.mvps.org/winhelp2002/hosts.htm
HOSTS physically blocks access to known bad sites. Of course you are depending on the person who created the list of sites. You should consider being more cautious about what links you click.
I assume you have Antivirus, antispyware and a firewall installed. IE Tools|Internet Options|Security and Privacy tabs also offer protection from bad site.
If you need more suggestions, post back for further information.

PeteC · 2006/11/10

Another way is using your firewall - I use CA Personal Firewall and block all ads, banners, etc. through that.

Evan Omo · 2006/11/10

Hey PeteC,
Thanks for your advice. Whenever I visit a website and there are banner ads I don't click them because I know that they will direct me to a bad website. I also do have Windows Firewall enabled, Windows Defender, Ad-aware Se Personal, Spybot search and Destroy, and Avast Home Edition installed. I am assuming that one of the only ways to disable banner ads is a hosts file? I am also assuming that there isn't an option in IE7 to disable banner ads? One more thing can you disable banner ads with the windows firewall or do you need a third party firewall? Please let me know. Thanks

Welshjim · 2006/11/10

Evan Omo--IE generally does not have the ability to block ads, except in the rare cases where the adsite insists on your allowing cookies in order to access the site. You can stop accepting cookies by putting the site into Restricted. But not accepting cookies prevents access to only very few sites. Similarly, you may prevent the use of ActiveX controls, but that blocks only some images, not access to the site.
The HOSTS file actually prevents access to a site. You will often see "The page cannot be displayed" on parts of a website that has ads from those blocked sites.

Evan Omo · 2006/11/10

Thanks for the information Welshjim. I guess I will use a hosts file to block those annoying banner ads then.

PeteC · 2006/11/11

To avoid any confusion here you do not have to create the HOSTS file - it already exists in XP. The link Jim gave will populate it with a list of undesirable websites which will then be blocked.

You will find it here ....

C:\WINDOWS\system32\drivers\etc\HOSTS

Note that it does not have an extension and can be opened in Notepad. The link Jim posted will populate it automatically for you.

Welshjim · 2006/11/11

PeteC--It has been so long since I created my own HOSTS file that I cannot remember. But I do not think Windows comes with a HOSTS file. It comes with a HOSTS.sam file which is a sample or template explaining how a HOSTS file should look. I seem to remember that I made a copy of HOSTS.sam, renamed to HOSTS (no .sam) and then populated it--at first on my own and then, when I learned about it, using the mvps.bat file in the mvps.org Hosts.zip file.
I am not sure that the browser will execute blocking action based on a file called HOSTS.sam. I may be wrong.
In any event, just moving the mvps.org HOSTS file into the proper location (for XP C:\WINDOWS\SYSTEM32\DRIVERS\ETC\ )--without using the mvps.bat file the first time around--will create an active HOSTS file. Thereafter updates can be quickly made by using the mvps.bat file that comes in the mvps.org Hosts.zip download.

TonyT · 2006/11/11

Evan Omo,
Just so you know, windowsbbs.com members can get a special membership here and this site won't have any ads. See this page:
http://www.windowsbbs.com/subscribe.php

PeteC · 2006/11/11

Jim

XP has a HOSTS file by default together with a HOSTS.sam (sample) hosts file as you rightly mention.

The default HOSTS file contains this ....

# Copyright (c) 1993-1999 Microsoft Corp.
#
# This is a sample HOSTS file used by Microsoft TCP/IP for Windows.
#
# This file contains the mappings of IP addresses to host names. Each
# entry should be kept on an individual line. The IP address should
# be placed in the first column followed by the corresponding host name.
# The IP address and the host name should be separated by at least one
# space.
#
# Additionally, comments (such as these) may be inserted on individual
# lines or following the machine name denoted by a '#' symbol.
#
# For example:
#
# 102.54.94.97 rhino.acme.com # source server
# 38.25.63.10 x.acme.com # x client host

127.0.0.1 localhost
Click to expand...

127.0.0.1 localhost is the active entry.

The HOSTS.sam contains this (truncated to save space) ....

# Copyright (c) 1993-1999 Microsoft Corp.
#
# This is a sample LMHOSTS file used by the Microsoft TCP/IP for Windows.
#
# This file contains the mappings of IP addresses to computernames
# (NetBIOS) names. Each entry should be kept on an individual line.
# The IP address should be placed in the first column followed by the
# corresponding computername. The address and the computername
# should be separated by at least one space or tab. The "#" character
# is generally used to denote the start of a comment (see the exceptions
# below).
#

# The following example illustrates all of these extensions:
#
# 102.54.94.97 rhino #PRE #DOM:networking #net group's DC
# 102.54.94.102 "appname \0x14" #special app server
# 102.54.94.123 popular #PRE #source server
# 102.54.94.117 localsrv #PRE #needed for the include
#
# #BEGIN_ALTERNATE
# #INCLUDE \\localsrv\public\lmhosts
# #INCLUDE \\rhino\public\lmhosts
# #END_ALTERNATE
#
# In the above example, the "appname" server contains a special
# character in its name, the "popular" and "localsrv" server names are
# preloaded, and the "rhino" server name is specified so it can be used
# to later #INCLUDE a centrally maintained lmhosts file if the "localsrv "
# system is unavailable.
#
# Note that the whole file is parsed including comments on each lookup,
# so keeping the number of comments to a minimum will improve performance.
# Therefore it is not advisable to simply add lmhosts file entries onto the
# end of this file.
Click to expand...

Welshjim · 2006/11/11

PeteC--The two quoted files you have posted are
First one--HOSTS.sam
Second one--LMHOSTS.SAM (don't why the "sam" is capitalized)
At least that is how they are named on my PC.
As mentioned, I can no longer remember if a file named just plain HOSTS came with XP Pro.

PeteC · 2006/11/11

Jim

I copied the HOSTS file from my laptop - plain HOSTS, no extension. I misnamed the hosts.sam file

As you can see I do not have the MVPS Hosts file on that as it rarely gets used on the Internet.

On my desktop I have the MVPS HOSTS installed - note that it contains the active line I mentioned ....

# This MVPS HOSTS file is a free download from: #
# http://www.mvps.org/winhelp2002/ #
# #
# Notes: the browser does not read this "#" symbol #
# You can create your own notes, after the # symbol #
# This *must* be the first line: 127.0.0.1 localhost #
# ********************************************************#
# ------------------Updated: 10-15-06---------------------#
# ********************************************************#
# Entries marked with Parasite or Trojan comments should #
# be placed in the Internet Explorer Restricted Zone. #
# http://mvps.org/winhelp2002/restricted.htm #
# #
# Entries with other comments are searchable via Google. #
# #
# Disclaimer: this file is free to use, however it is NOT #
# permitted to post on any other site without permission. #
# #
# This work is licensed under the Creative Commons #
# Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike License. #
# http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/2.0/ #

127.0.0.1 localhost

#start of lines added by WinHelp2002
# [Misc A - Z]
127.0.0.1 asy.a8ww.net
127.0.0.1 www.acezip.net #[Win32/Adware.180Solutions]
127.0.0.1 ad588.net #[Win32/PSW.Legendmir]
127.0.0.1 adserver.adbunker.com
127.0.0.1 phpadsnew.abac.com
127.0.0.1 a.abnad.net
127.0.0.1 b.abnad.net
127.0.0.1 c.abnad.net #[IE-SpyAd]
and so on ....
Click to expand...

Welshjim · 2006/11/11

PeteC--I think we both agree that the line 127.0.0.1 localhost must appear in the HOSTS file at the beginning of sites to be blocked. And that the file must be named just plain HOSTS.
P.S. I see that you are one update behind on your mvps.org HOSTS file. Latest is dated October 30.

PeteC · 2006/11/11

Thanks for that, Jim - I must update

Evan Omo · 2006/11/11

Thanks again everyone for all the information.

Welshjim · 2006/11/11

Evan Omo--You are welcome!! Hope it makes you more secure.

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