I cannot believe that Pop-Ups haven’t been outlawed - like tresspassing! How do I stop these damn things? I have Earthlink, not AOL, if it matters. Is there a quick, easy, and (hopefully) free way to stop these things?
Also, I have a firewall, but is it really doing any good, really? If the pop-ups and junk mail still gets through…aren’t the creators of viruses smart enough to by-pass my firewall as well???
Earthlink offers a pop-up blocker - a little piece of software that automatically closes pop-up windows as soon as they open. Not sure why yours isn’t on. Alternatively (and for those of us without earthlink or comparable), you can find lots of free pop-up blockers by Googling pop-up blockers or pop-up killers. Either way will turn up lots of options. That’s where I got mine. They’re great! I have different ones on my home and work machines and they both work fine. I’d say just pick one that looks good.
I use PanicWare Pop-Up Stopper.
Very good, but still doesn’t stop the Java pop-ups.
I don’t know if it’s still around; I’ve had it for ages.
You could use a different browser; I use Opera and it’s not only a much better browser than IE but has very easy pop-up killing abilities. I find it much quicker too.
I think there is some confusion about what a firewall can and should do. Your browser is probably talking to your chosen sites’ web servers on port 80. You can’t block this without blocking all browser access. A popup is just more java/html which comes back with the html stream which the browser blindly honours.
Junk mail similarly. You either subscribe to a junkmail filtering service or get busy creating rules for your email client to follow in sorting/deleting incoming mail according to content.
One way to virtually eliminate popups is to disable javascript (Tools->Internet Options, Security tab, Custom Level button, disable Active Scripting). It is a bit of a pain though because many sites require javascript so you have to re-enable it when you visit those sites.
For straight out pop-up blocking, I recommend EMS Free Surfer. It not only has options for pop-up blocking, but disabling Java, clearing your cache, disabling flash animations and GIF animations (you know the flashing “You’ve WON!!” ads).
You can get it here: www.emsproject.com/FS
If you want a better web browser with built-in pop up blocking, I’d recommend Avant Browser. It creates a shell for IE to sit in and like Firebird or Opera it allows for tabbed browsing and all sorts of other features. The biggest problem with Opera and Firebird is that the world is just too IE centric (I know, it sucks but it’s true). Some webpages just won’t display correctly or function correctly if you are not using IE.
You can get that at www.avantbrowser.com
Both of these programs are freeware.
Happy Surfing.
Best bet for IE would be to download the google taskbar for IE. It has a built in pop up blocker that you can turn on or off.
Google’s new toolbar blocks popups; it’s what I use. (You can choose whether to allow Google to monitor your websites; I see no percentage in letting them watch where I go online, so I turned it off, and assume that keeps them from peeping in on me)
Daniel
Yep, latest Google toolbar for IE (dunno if it works with Mac). Haven’t had a single pop-up since I installed it.
Use the Google toolbar to block 'em in IE as others have suggested, or use the Mozilla browser.
Here’s another vote for the Google Toolbar. I downloaded it a month ago and don’t know how I lived without it!
I used to get so many pop-ups I wanted to throw puter out the window. It’s one thing to block pop-ups but you have to get rid of the markers already in your system. try ad-aware I haven’t gotten any pop-ups since.Install it and run it and you’ll be amazed to see how many markers are on your puter.You can set it to run on start-up and it will clean your files every time. In my opinion this software is simply amazing.
www.lavasoftusa.com/support/download
I could be wrong, but I doubt it.
I have to vote for Opera (www.opera.com) not only because of the speed, popup blocker, tabbed windows, skinnable interface, and general all-around spiffyness, but because the built-in mail client removes the pain that could be caused by Outlook as well.
(Oh, and mouse gestures! I cannot go back to browsing without them, they are great!)
Only problem with the Mozzila browser that I have is the lack of flash or shockwave acess. Nothing I do gets it to work. So when I found the pop up blocking power of google task bar, I grabed at it.
Kookiecanuck brings up an important point. There are two different ways you can get pop-ups: either they are sent by the site you are visiting, or you have been infected with some kind of adware program. In the former case, you need to get a pop-up killer and/or a better browser, as most posters here have suggested. In the latter case, a pop-up killer may or may not help but you really want to attack the root cause, using a program such as Ad-Aware.
Most respectable sites won’t send pop-ups. The Straight Dope site doesn’t, for example; if you get them while browsing this site then you’ve been infected.
To avoid getting (re)-infected with adware or spyware:
a) Regularly use an up-to-date version of something like Ad-Aware.
b) Only install software from a reputable source (for whatever that’s worth; I have heard reports that even Logitech mouse drivers, straight from the manufacturer, may install spyware on your machine nowadays).
c) If, while browsing, one of those “you are about to install the following software” boxes appears, do not click “OK” unless you are certain that you trust the site and understand what the software is going to do.
d) Keep your browser up-to-date: some spyware/adware makers aren’t above exploiting security bugs in your machine to install their trash. Using a less-mainstream browser will help you here as well.
I also have had excellent results with the Google toolbar. Kills everything except those hyper-annoying embedded Flash things. Note that some people would classify it as low-level spyware, because it sends some limited info on your browsing habits back to Google in order to drive the “PageRank” feature, but you can turn that off if you don’t like it.
You can download it from Google’s homepage.
Another vote for Google. What can’t they do?
Get used to pop-ups. X10 camera, anyone?
I’d just like to chime in and say thanks to the folks who’ve posted information on the google toolbar and the lavasoft ad aware program. I too had been frustrated with pop-ups, and was using the PanicWare pop-up stopper to mediocre results. I knew I must have some spyware-type programs in my computer that were triggering some of these things, and I had set about removing some of them manually. But that Ad Aware, which I just ran, was amazing and seems to have taken care of the problem.
Thanks again,
montag01