Is there a simple way to disable MSN Messenger?

Factual Questions
1

Is there a simple way to disable MSN Messenger or otherwise prevent its use on our computer? (and, if so, a simple way to re-enable or unblock the program?)

Thanks for this!

P.S. My daughter will hate me if this works :frowning: but you gotta do what you gotta do.

2

Yes. I finally got so fed up with popups and spyware that I manually trashed MSIE: put it in the trash and emptied it.

I have had opportunity to regret it since, but I’ve managed to get over it.

I hate Bill Gates.

3

Have you ever tried that funky search engine called Google?

4

Click on Start | Run.

Enter this:

RunDll32 advpack.dll,LaunchINFSection %windir%\INF\msmsgs.inf,BLC.Remove

5

Read the OP, peeps. He doesn’t want to permanently remove it.

6

Hey, thanks DarrenS!

And, Duckster, what is this Goggle of which you speak? What are the annual fees? And where can I learn how to use it? More seriously, if I or anyone else on this board who has some modicum of specialized knowledge were to sneer, “check Google”, “do a search”, or “I found the answer with my first hit on Yahoo search, did you even try?”, we’d never have to answer another question. In my estimation, virtually every medical question I’ve seen posted on the SDMB is easily answerable with a web simple search (or, alas, is too silly to even have an answer).

So, thanks again DarrenS. Much obliged. In subjects in which I’m totally ignorant, I feel a lot more comfortable getting a succinct answer from I “know” rather than hope that I’m interpreting some web article accurately.

7

… getting a succinct answer from someone I “know” rather …

8

I’d say the best (and free) is Shoot-the-Messenger, from Steve Gibson of Gibson Research (producer of the famous SpinRite Disk Repair software).

It’s available at http://www.grc.com/stm/shootthemessenger.htm

He has several other free utilities available at http://www.grc.com

9

From the link,

so it’s got nothing to do with MSN Messenger, but it’s still a REALLY good thing to do!
IMNSHO every security tip Steve Gibson has on his site is a MUST DO!

10

Yeah, Windows Messenger is nothing to do with MSN Messenger – but it is evil nonetheless. It’s one of the first things I disable whenever I perform a new XP install for someone. (I think it comes pre-disabled in SP2 installs, now that I think about it)

For reference, disabling Windows Messenger is as easy as clicking Start->Run, entering “msconfig” clicking on the “startup” tab and unchecking the entry “msmsgs”

I’ve never used MSN Messenger but I believe it can also be found here as an entry labeled “msnmsgr.exe” – unchecking that will disable MSN from running the next time you reboot. To re-enable, follow the same steps and check “msnmsgr.exe” and reboot.

11

I’m assuming your daughter is spending too much time chatting on MSN messenger and you are trying to limit it. I wouldn’t bother with any technical solutions to try and disable/enable the program. She can easily get around just about anything you do, including using a different chat client that can connect to the MSN service.

Sorry, you have to do the parent thing and actually enforce the rules yourself.

12

Depends on how technically inclined she is, but you are probably correct. Not only are there different clients, but there’s web-based interfaces.

13

The only thing I can think of is blocking access to the program through a firewall and then password protecting the firewall. However, that won’t stop her from using the web client.