those **** messenger popups

how do i block those messegner popup ads? i am greatly confused, as whenever i am connected to the interent i keep getting these damn things, which are really annoying me now. currently, am sitting behind a firewall, an nat and an antivirus program, and still they get through. i have been unable to determine how to block them witht he friewall, because they seem to use the same ports as genuine internet activity (although i may well be wrong here), and i dont even have the messenger service installed on my computer anymore.

if its relevant, the current setup is as follows:

win2k server connected via dialup to internet, running nat (dial on demand), sygate firewall and f-secure antivirus.
the workstations are also running f-secure.

i have run out of options, have even uninstalled the message queing service from the server, all to no avail.

i am loth to actually go to the website and download (and probably have to pay for) some horrible little bit of useless software, which i only use because the company concerned is using highly dubious advertising techniques.

has anyone else had this problem?

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Originally posted by Six Eyed Smily
how do i block those messegner popup ads? i am greatly confused, as whenever i am connected to the interent i keep getting these damn things, which are really annoying me now. currently, am sitting behind a firewall, an nat and an antivirus program, and still they get through. i have been unable to determine how to block them witht he friewall, because they seem to use the same ports as genuine internet activity (although i may well be wrong here), and i dont even have the messenger service installed on my computer anymore.

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Messenger service (not msn messenger) can be disabled in services.msc (start run, type in services.msc) first, double click the service to bring up the properties page, stop the service and then change the startup type to disable.

As to your firewall, port 139 should not be open any way!! How many other ports do you have open?

if you are constantly having annoying ads, after you disable the messanger service, checkout ad-aware its pretty kewl proggie, removes nasty little internet programs that like to install from java, and includes a service that will watch and prevent future attempts....

to be honest, my ifrewall, doesnt seem to have a list of ports it blocks, i think i need to upgrade to the non free version (sygate personal firewall pro).

might do that, actually, its not really a lot of money ($40 ~ £26)

thanks, anyway, will see if disabling the service helps.

Before shelling out the bucks, you could try this free program:

EMS Free Surfer mkII

check your startup folder too. I had the same problem and actually out-smarted myself. I disabled the messenger service, closed firewall ports, ran trojan scans, ran numerous virus scans and scoured the registry looking for something. . . . . . here it was some program called DownloadPlus and it was sitting right in the startup folder. . . . .:p DUH!:p

guess I gave the scumware developers too much credit. :D

hehe :)

disabling messenger service seems to have done the trick... when/if i upgrade my firewall, i may try re-enabling it and just blocking specific ports, but untill then all is good :)