the time has came...

forcer

OSNN Senior Addict
Joined
18 Oct 2002
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413
i dreaded this day, but its now came, my sister now has a need for MSN, and my parents learned how to download music. i come home night after night to find one of them sitting at my computer talking to random people or downloading some sh** music or trying to act like they know something about ebay.

to a certain extent i can live with it... but now my sisters million accounts are listed on the msn messenger box... the various girly sites she visits are delivering alot of ad-ware and spyware to my computer and i can see these problems getting worse.

while i persuade them to buy a new computer i'll need to setup some extra stuff that stops them doing things... i would like to totally block my sister from msn.. is it possible to block access to any email except mine?

how can i stop her from visiting certain sites, i dont actually know any URL's but i want to block out game sites she visits or whatever they are.

i could create a new account on XP, which i believe will leave my area clean and tidy, but with her bogging up crap on her account i can still see a performance lapse.

are there any 'power' tools i can download so i can create an account and block file sharing over msn, cookies and any other stuff?

has anyone else ran into a dilema like this, how was it resolved?

any help appreciated.
 
If it is your computer just set a bios lock password, which brings up everytime you boot up so you can only goto windows if you enter right password.

I did this for my fiances PC so the kids she teaches and no-one else in her school can access windows without her permission!
 
Go to C:\Windows\System32\Drivers\Etc, open the hosts file with notepad. Then set the 127.0.0.1 to the sites she goes to. Example:

127.0.0.1 popcapgames.com

Each entry will look like that.
 
Good idea on editing the HOSTS file.

Also, you can set preferences in IE that will disable downloading of certain content that might be harmful to your system.

Consider this though, how much trouble would it be to educate your sister on what not to download and why?
 
i already did, i told her that she downloaded ad-ware, and was accepting files over msn of stupid videos, exe files, and certain images... she vowed not to do it again, but i come on tonight and i homepage is changed to about.co.uk and has a search bar on my explorer, and many popups, she lost her chance... heh :)

ideally i would just like to set a password for my account and lock her out, but then my parents would be like its not just for you, even though its in my room, and i bought most of it myself or from a present... i tried taking the batteries out of my mouse.. they figured that out.

there must be some xp tool that lets u change things from a useraccount? hmm
 
Does everyone have their own accounts or is ur's the only 1? I would suggest to ur parents that everyone can have their own account - creates your own settings etc. as you may already know. - Just let them know cos it's easier for you to keep your part of the pc tidy etc.?

If you can do this, set urs to be the only administrator account, and reduce her temp internet folder size to 10 Mb or something. I'm pretty sure you can set a limit on the overall size her documents can be.
 
Definitely create multiple accounts like a1 said if you haven't already. You can severely limit your sister's account by hiding access to programs that you don't want her using and by setting the preferences in IE like I already stated. If you set her to a Limited account, which I recommend, then she won't be able to install most things either.
 
you could install Firefox or something and then using the Program Access and Defaults disallow access to MSIE for her, which would reduce the adware issue a bit
 
forcer said:
has anyone else ran into a dilema like this, how was it resolved?

any help appreciated.


answer1) yes
resolved answer) made them buy their own PC

make sure to keep up with virus definitions and
put spybot 1.3 and ad-aware and keep them on a loop....
:)
 
I also am all in favour of creating new accounts with limited rights. Your sister would need administrative privileges to install anything, lets say a explorer bar.

Also setting the cache size to a lower value would do the trick.

The security settings are user-based not system-wide right? Set the security setting to the highest level (or custom level) and block all cookies on the privacy page.

Install a AntiVirus and set it to scan the whole machine as your parents or your sister log-on.

I don't know if Ad-Aware has a command line mode, but you could use scheduled tasks to perform background scanning and cleaning.

I don't think altering the hosts file is a good idea: imagine your parents spending hours on the phone with some ISP Support techy discussing "the page cannot be displayed"-issue... (I bet he wouldn't have found it :D)

You can use TweakUI to set some restrictions (like removing control panel) but I don't really know if the settings are system-, or user-based. Also, creating the othe limited accounts would make it possible to strip the start menu from unnecessary things, like control panel, scheduled tasks, run command, printers and faxes and so on.



Just my two cents...
 
yeah i think thats what i'll do just create a lmited guest account ;)thanx.

is the windows firewall userbased? if so whats the port for file sharing over msn
 
the beta spybot runs in the background, so u can set that to start with windows, that will stop 99% of the spyware...
 
I've had this too - final and optimal resolution is undoubtedly to have additional computer. Hers could become the legacy and yours could be the new - also parents may be more persuaded if you could point out there is scope for networking so that you (presumably being more technically able) could keep backup for your sister (make sure large secondary drive in new machine). Of course I realise this is dream solution and not immediate.

Another thing you could do to encourage good housekeepig/proper sharing is to enable disc quotas. You'll probably find some bugs int he reporting on defrag (I know I did) but they do essentially work. You'll undoubtedly need to run more adaware and spy-bot scans - my record removal from the old machine after I left it for a while was about 98 instances! Also run the spybot S&D resident - and tell her not to allow changes when she is playing. You could consider uninstalling messenger entirely - if that is not too drastic? Or maybe trillian or miranda could be used instead with the minimal client?

Hope it works out for you anyway.
 
Sounds to me

Sounds to me like a lot of your problesm could be fixed by downloading and installing the proper programs on your computer to help keep it clean and protect it.

I would recommend downloading Spybot Search & Destroy 1.3, as well as Adaware, Spywareblaster, and a good popup stopper like Bayden's PopupPopper or even the Google toolbar (I've also heard the MSN Toolbar ain't half bad).

Also, set up another XP account for her, and make her a limited user, that will solve a lot of the problems you are having, and I don't think it really is going to affect performance in any noticable way.
 

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Also Hi EP and people. I found this place again while looking through a oooollllllldddd backup. I have filled over 10TB and was looking at my collection of antiques. Any bids on the 500Mhz Win 95 fix?
Any of the SP crew still out there?
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Just did some crude math and I apparently joined almost 18yrs ago, how is that possible???
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