# Whats wrong with my hotmail?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-wrong-with-my-hotmail/228729>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [February 11, 2004, 10:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-wrong-with-my-hotmail/228729 "2004-02-11T22:27:53Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 4\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![bryanmaguire](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/d07c76/32.png) [@bryanmaguire](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bryanmaguire)\
**Post date:** [February 11, 2004, 10:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-wrong-with-my-hotmail/228729/1 "2004-02-11T22:27:53Z")

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I cant seem get in to hotmail from my home PC. I type in the username and password, press enter and then a few seconds later it comes up “page not found”. I cant even check for new messages from outlook expess like I could before. I’ve deleted all my cookies in case it could be a dodgy cookie but no luck. Weird thing is I can log in to it from work. Any ideas?

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**Author:** ![ShibbOleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/848f3c/32.png) [@ShibbOleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ShibbOleth)\
**Post date:** [February 11, 2004, 10:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-wrong-with-my-hotmail/228729/2 "2004-02-11T22:31:52Z")

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I had a similar problem and was getting a Netpassport error. I tried everything, even sent a note to Microsoft, got a reply asking for more info (even though that info was included in my original note). I never heard from them, but in the meantime I downloaded Mozilla ([www.mozilla.org](http://www.mozilla.org)) and now have no problems. Do you also use Internet Explorer? If so I’d give a non-MS browser a shot.

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**Author:** ![Nightsong](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/nightsong/32/3083_2.png) [@Nightsong](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nightsong)\
**Post date:** [February 11, 2004, 11:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-wrong-with-my-hotmail/228729/3 "2004-02-11T23:19:18Z")

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By any chance, have you downloaded the latest batch of updates from Microsoft? If I remember correctly, one of the patches kinda broke Explorer, so they had to release a patch for the patch. If you haven’t gotten any patches recently, you may want to try getting 'em all. And if you hadn’t gotten any patches for awhile…err… dunno.

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\<\< Hit any user to continue. \>\>

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**Author:** ![pcroughn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/977dab/32.png) [@pcroughn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pcroughn)\
**Post date:** [February 12, 2004, 1:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-wrong-with-my-hotmail/228729/4 "2004-02-12T01:37:41Z")

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You might be dealing with Malware or Spyware of some sort. I had the same problem. But don’t start bawlin’ yet, it’s an easy fix.

Get yourself a copy of Spybot Search & Destroy and AdAware. Both are free or offer free versions.

Spybot:  
[http://download.com.com/3000-8022-10194058.html](http://download.com.com/3000-8022-10194058.html)

AdAware:  
[http://download.com.com/3000-8022-10214379.html](http://download.com.com/3000-8022-10214379.html)

I’m not going to go into the usage of these, as they have adequate help files.

If you are already using these guys, make sure they are updated. Each has a button that updates for you. New updates can come out weekly or even daily, so keep un top of it.

Hope this helps.