Computer Help

[cavebear]

I am suddenly getting a series of "Messenger Service" popups. Do I have a virus, or is this just some new thing we all have to suffer? Is there a way to get rid of them? They seem to popup every 5-10 minutes on average but the timing fluctuates greatly. There are several different ones, but there seems to be a limited number in rotation.

[reds4ever]

Newsgroups?

[cavebear]

I don't belong to any newsgroups that I know of...

[General Ludd]

Windows XP has built in spam. You need to disable the messenger thing at startup through msconfig. (START -> RUN -> Type it in.)

[boann]

you don't have gater on your computer do you?
might want to download ADAWARE
it will clean it out of most stuff

[Neutrino]

I'd do the following:

1. Check for viruses using free virus scanner at pcpitstop.com

2. Run Ad-Aware

3. Run Spy-bot

If none of those solve the problem, see if you can run another antivirus utility.

[geeslaka]

What happened when you went to endads.com?

[General Ludd]

It's not a virus or any of that. It's ****ing microsoft messenger. Comes with windows XP. I had to disable this hunk of **** after upgrading to WinXP from 98.

[Kassiopeia]

Like Osweld said, it's the evil Microsoft Messenger. You can also disable it by Start -> Run -> type services.msc , pick "Messenger service", and set "startup type" to "disabled". Can't remember if that was for Win2k though (I'm using Win98 myself).

[SlowwHand]

PCPitstop is a good site, for sure for sure.

[cavebear]

I have Windows XP (and I'm beginning to regret it).

Osweld - thanks for the advice. I think I did what you intended I do. It didn't want to let me disable Messenger and the options were rather obfuscatory, but I think I undid Messenger. And I had "upgraded" from 98 to XP.

Kassiopeio - I think thgat's what I did, but it's hard to tell what some of the da*n questions it asks really mean. Thanks both, and I'll hope this solves the problem.

[cavebear]

30 minutes (at least) and no new "Messenger Service" popup! Thanks for the help...

[asleepathewheel]

My wife gets this pop up too, very annoying.

Oddly enough, I don't get it (xp home) but she and our lap top are bombarded (xp pro). the windows progs are all the same, so not sure whats going on there.

If she leaves her pc on at night, she'll have twenty or so of them to click out of in the morning.

[Rasbelin]

Kassi,

sorry, but it's not called Microsoft Messenger.

First of all it has to do with Messenger Service system service which Kassiopeia pointed out correctly. It's only related to NT based Windows operating systems as home Windows doesn't run with services. Messenger Service is a simple network service meant for system administrators to easily send notifications to network computers (e.g. announcing a downtime or something similar). Useful feature and not evil, unlike some people claimed here (do your homework better). The only problem is that it's enabled by default in all Windows XP and 2000 (can't remember how it's in NT), which means that some ad spammers have invented to use it, now as NT technology has entered home desktop PCs with Win XP. This hasn't been changed in SP1 or any of the updates to e.g. Win XP, so you have to set it to Manual or Disabled yourself, It's of no use for home users, but in some extense for corporate use, IMO. Sending messages using Messenger Service is quite easy (you can look on MS TechNet), but powerful use like the ad spammers do, requires a program which can do it all automated. I have tried the most popular one and sure is powerful. However I disclose the name or any details on how to get it, as it includes several malicious security tools.

While you're into it, also check that you have UPnP disabled on your system. You can use UnPlug n' Pray by GRC for it (download link).

Enjoy abit more secure Windows computing after chaning the service settings.

[Q Classic]

asuka's right. it's intended for server administrators, but.

in any case, to turn it off semi-permanently:

start-->control panel-->administrative tools-->services
look for "messenger", right click-->properties
change "startup type" to "disabled" or "manual"
select "ok".

if you want to turn it off every time you log in, open up the command window at any time and type:
net stop messenger