I was wondering if there is any way to prevent Internet Explorer from opening a “pop-up” browser window automaticaly. A lot more web pages seem to be doing this now, and I think it’s annoying. Some of them are offensive to my girlfriend, who is an ex-gambling addict. Having ads for online casinos pop up in front of her bothers her a bit. Is there any way to diable this so-called “feature”? Microsoft, unfortunately, has been less than forthcoming with an answer to my e-mail. Any Tech-endowed people out there know the answer?
From what I heard, you need to download certain anti-popup programs (I don’t know any off-hand), or you need to disable Javascripts, which would result in ALL Javascript programs you encounter to cease functioning.
I use KillAd. It does exactly what you describe. Available for download at:
http://wwwwin.wplus.net/pp/fsc/
(Like five million popups will hit you when you first load the site, which I guess is the site owner’s idea of making a point…just ignore it, the program is actually really worthwhile.)
porn sites are the worst for pop ups. real bugger when your gf catches you…
You may also want to take a look at WebWasher, a free (for personal/educational use) program that has a lot of options for removing unwanted ads and JavaScript. It was developed at Siemens, the German industrial giant, for internal use.
catmandu42 - this has been discussed a few times in the General Questions forum, and I believe in here too. You might try searching for threads for other recommendations.
I like Pop-up stopper from http://www.panicware.com - minimalist and to the point. I’ve also used Naviscope (www.naviscope.com) which along with eliminating pop-ups, has a number of other “smart surfing” features.
Anyone know why Microsoft and Netscape don’t include a “no pop-ups” feature in their browsers? Does the porn industry have such a large lobby? 
I use the Proximatron.
It’s a universal, highly configurable web filter. You can set it up to eliminate popups, banner ads, flashing text, animations, nosy javascripting, or really just about anything you desire, as the matching language is very versatile. There’s a mailing list where new filters are distributed. And it’s free. If you haven’t installed it yet, you should.