I have banished the Yahoo Toolbar from my PCs. It's not that I have anything against Yahoo. I use many of the company's services.
It's just that for me, the shortcuts on the Yahoo Toolbar don't justify the lost screen space, especially on my 13.3-inch laptop display.
So imagine my surprise when I happened to find the Yahoo Toolbar listed among Firefox's add-ons. (It snuck in when another user of the machine downloaded the Yahoo IM client.)
You might be surprised by the add-ons and extensions that have wormed their way into your copy of Internet Explorer 7 or Firefox 3.
You can work your way through the list of add-ons in your favorite browser, disabling and uninstalling those you don't need. Or you can save time by opening IE 7 and Firefox 3 with all add-ons and extensions disabled.
To open Internet Explorer with no add-ons or ActiveX controls working, click Start > All Programs > Accessories > System Tools > Internet Explorer (No-Add-ons). (In Vista, a faster way to open IE with no add-ons is by pressing the Windows key, typing Internet Explorer, and choosing Internet Explorer (No Add-ons) in the resulting list of shortcuts.)
To disable all of Firefox's add-ons, you have to open the browser in its Safe Mode (no relation to Windows' own Safe Mode) by clicking Start > All Programs > Mozilla Firefox > Mozilla Firefox (Safe Mode). A quicker way is to press the Windows key (in XP, follow this by pressing R), type Firefox -safe-mode, and press Enter.
Disable all add-ons in Firefox by starting the browser in Safe Mode and selecting the "Disable" option.
(Credit: Mozilla)In the Firefox Safe Mode dialog box that appears before Firefox opens, click "Disable all add-ons" and choose the Make Changes and Restart button to run the browser with no add-ons or extensions enabled.
I can't tell you for sure that every feature of every Web site you visit will work as designed, nor can I say unequivocally that you'll be browsing faster with no add-ons enabled. But I made the rounds of my favorite sites in each browser's no-add-ons mode and didn't feel like I was missing anything. In fact, the only way I knew my add-ons were disabled in IE was seeing the Manage Add-ons option grayed out on the Tools menu.
The "Manage Add-ons" option on IE's Tools menu is grayed out when you open the browser with all add-ons disabled.
(Credit: Microsoft)Disabling add-ons and extensions one at a time is a snap in both Firefox and IE. In the former, click Tools > Add-ons, select an entry under the Extensions tab, and click Disable. To toss an extension, click Uninstall. You can disable (but not uninstall) Firefox's plug-ins by clicking the Plug-ins tab, selecting an entry, and clicking Disable.
In IE, you can turn off add-ons one by one by clicking Tools > Manage Add-ons > Enable or Disable Add-ons. You have your choice of four views on the Show menu at the top of the Manage Add-ons dialog box (the default is "Add-ons currently loaded in Internet Explorer"). To disable an add-on, select it and choose Disable at the bottom of the dialog box.
You have a choice of four views when enabling or disabling add-ons in IE's Manage Add-ons dialog box.
(Credit: Microsoft)One reason you may need to disable your browser's add-ons is to troubleshoot poor performance. Microsoft provides a step-by-step guide for fixing problems with Internet Explorer, and one of the steps is disabling your add-ons and re-enabling them individually until the problem recurs, at which time you've found the troublemaker.
You'll find more information about Firefox add-ons at the Firefox Support Knowledge Base.
To the short list of life's certainties--death and taxes--we can now add "Web threats."
Early indications are that there will be no quick fix for clickjacking, which enables a PC to be infected with malicious software simply by clicking a disguised link on a Web page. All browsers are equally vulnerable, and there appears to be no sure solution, at least in the short term. Even disabling JavaScript and other advanced Web features won't prevent an infection.
Does this mean you should cancel your broadband account and dig out the ham radio? I don't recommend it. In fact, reports such as these show the folly of believing that our Web browsing is ever completely safe. No hardware or software will ever be 100 percent secure.
Yes, keep your antivirus definitions up-to-date. Yes, use a firewall. Download and install Giorgio Maone's NoScript extension for Firefox (donation requested) to gain site-by-site control over the scripts that run in the browser.
But even these precautions are no substitute for common sense. Be careful about the sites you visit and the links you click. View your e-mail as plain text; Microsoft's support site provides instructions for doing so in Outlook 2003 and 2007. In Mozilla Thunderbird, simply click View, Message Body As, Plain Text.
Last, but definitely not least, every PC user must acknowledge that the day will dawn when their system crashes for good--whether due to a malware attack or (more likely) a hardware or software failure. Keep your data backed up. In addition to creating an image backup of your hard drive once or twice a year, using a program such as Acronis' $50 True Image Home (15-day free trial), use an online backup service to keep your important data files fresh.
Modern browsers are much better than their predecessors at keeping your Web activity private and your data safe. Still, you may not have your browser configured to provide optimum security. Take a few minutes to give Internet Explorer 7 and Firefox 2 a safety check.
Batten down IE7's hatches
The version of IE7 for Vista adds the Protected Mode, which allows Web sites to access only the Temporary Internet Files folder on your PC. According to Microsoft, this feature is on by default for the Internet, Intranet, and Restricted zones, but disabled for the Trusted Sites and Local Machine zones. On my machine it was enabled for all zones. You'll see "Protected Mode: On" in the status bar when it's active, or click Tools > Internet Options > Security, and make sure "Enable Protected Mode (requires restarting Internet Explorer)" is checked at the bottom of each zone.
Maximize security in IE7 for Vista by making sure Protected Mode is enabled.
(Credit: Microsoft)There have been some reports of Protected Mode causing problems, so if a particular page won't load or run correctly, disabling this feature may solve the glitch, though I don't recommend keeping Protected Mode off. The Web's not getting any safer, and you need all the protection you can get.
Another great new feature in IE7--for XP and Vista alike--is the Phishing Filter. Why the filter is off by default I'll never know. To activate it, click Tools > Phishing Filter > Turn On Automatic Website Checking > OK. Unfortunately, choosing Tools > Phishing Filter > Phishing Filter Settings merely opens the Advanced Internet Options dialog box, where you can scroll down to the Phishing Filter section under Security, only to find that your only two options are to disable the filter, and to "turn off automatic website checking." But while you're in the Advanced Options settings, make sure "Automatically check for Internet Explorer updates" is checked in the Browsing section. Click OK when you're done.
Get into the habit of covering your browsing tracks on a regular basis. In IE7 you can wipe out your browser history, Temporary Internet Files, cookies, saved form data, and saved passwords at one time by clicking Tools > Delete Browsing History > Delete All. Or erase each category separately by clicking the appropriate button in the Delete Browsing History dialog box.
Wipe your browser's history clean by clicking Delete All in IE7's Delete Browsing History dialog, or clear each category separately.
(Credit: Microsoft)
Stay safe while browsing with Firefox
Just because Mozilla's open-source browser has a reputation for security doesn't mean you can use it to visit any site on the Web without a care in the world. Last month I described NoScript, a free Firefox add-on (donationware, actually) that lets you decide which scripts can run on which Web pages on a case-by-case basis. If you use Firefox regularly and you haven't added NoScript, download and install it, and in no time you'll wonder how you ever browsed without it.
There's another simple step you can take to improve Firefox's security: Make sure you have the browser set to update automatically. The current version is 2.0.0.12; to check your copy's version, click Help > About Mozilla Firefox, and look for the version number under the product's name. To verify that the program updates automatically, click Tools > Options > Advanced > Updates, and make sure Firefox is checked under "Automatically check for updates to." You may also want to check "Automatically download and install the update" under "When updates to Firefox are found." I also check "Installed Add-ons" under the former, and "Warn me if this will disable any of my add-ons" under the latter.
Set Firefox to check for updates automatically via the Advanced Options dialog box.
(Credit: Mozilla Foundation)Not long ago an attempt was made to spoof Firefox's address bar to fool people into thinking they were on a site other than the one they were actually visiting when a link opened in a new window. The simplest way to avoid this is by setting Firefox to open links in a new tab rather than a new window: Click Tools > Options > Tabs, and make sure "A new tab" is selected under "New pages should be opened in." You can also disable this feature by typing about:config in the address bar, pressing Enter, navigating to dom.disable_window_open_feature.location, and double-clicking it to change it to "true".
Web sites often know the page you were on before you opened one of their pages. To block this referrer header, type about:config in the address bar, press Enter, navigate to network.http.sendRefererHeader, double-click it, and set the integer value to 0.
Tomorrow: Get your Office docs online with Office Live Workspace.
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