Lock-icon gone on my dial-up icon but firewall says "On"

[pcBody1]

Before I put SP2 on my computer and my XP firewall was turned on, there
would always be a little "lock" showing on the dial-up internet connection.
Now, even when the XP firewall says it is on, there is no lock showing. Is
this normal? Shouldn't the lock-icon still be showing on my the icon for my
dial-up connection?

 

[Sharon F]

Before I put SP2 on my computer and my XP firewall was turned on, there
would always be a little "lock" showing on the dial-up internet connection.
Now, even when the XP firewall says it is on, there is no lock showing. Is
this normal? Shouldn't the lock-icon still be showing on my the icon for my
dial-up connection?

I believe the lock icon is from the Zone Alarm Firewall. Did you have that
installed before?

XP's firewall does not have a lock icon. It will just show the firewall as
enabled in Network Connections. If you install SP2 and no firewall is
detected (or active), the XP firewall is enabled.

 

[pcBody1]

Hello Sharon. No, I have never had zone alarm. The little lock graphic that
appears on the internet connection has always been there. It was there
before I installed SP1 and after I installed SP1. I just noticed after I
installed sp2 that it was no longer showing.

 

[Sharon F]

Hello Sharon. No, I have never had zone alarm. The little lock graphic that
appears on the internet connection has always been there. It was there
before I installed SP1 and after I installed SP1. I just noticed after I
installed sp2 that it was no longer showing.

Any other firewalls installed in the past besides Windows? Internet
security program?

The only lock that I can think of that Windows shows (related to internet
and connections) is in the browser window. That one appears in the status
bar of the browser window whenever you're connected to secure sites/page.
It will not show when connected to general /open to the public pages. If
this is the one that you're referring to, check that View> Status Bar is
selected in Internet Explorer's menus.

 

[pcBody1]

No no, I drag a shortcut to my desktop. The shortcut goes to the dialup
connection that I have to create in order to dial up and connect to the
internet. That shortcut, on the desktop and on the one I also have on the
taskbar, used to have a little lock on it when the xp firewall was enabled.
When I disabled it, the lock would go off.

Let us try another method, because all I am really worried about is if my xp
firewall is on--even though it says it is on. How can I test my firewall? I
am posting this under a different thread. Bye.

 

[Sharon F]

No no, I drag a shortcut to my desktop. The shortcut goes to the dialup
connection that I have to create in order to dial up and connect to the
internet. That shortcut, on the desktop and on the one I also have on the
taskbar, used to have a little lock on it when the xp firewall was enabled.
When I disabled it, the lock would go off.

Let us try another method, because all I am really worried about is if my xp
firewall is on--even though it says it is on. How can I test my firewall? I
am posting this under a different thread. Bye.

I thought you were referring to the network connection/active connection
icon but XP will not show a lock on that icon as mentioned in my first
response. To see if a connection is firewalled, check its description in
Network Connections. The word "firewalled" will be present if XP firewall
is active.

I only mentioned IE since it is the only place that I can think of where a
lock icon natively appears when connected to the internet. Any other lock
icons for internet activity that I've seen came from other software - not
Windows.

 

[xfiler]

I am going to assume this is ISP specific.

xfiler

 

[Sharon F]

I am going to assume this is ISP specific.

The lock? Could be but only if the ISP software is installed. That software
could conceivably layer a lock icon over an active connection tray item
that is protected by XP's firewall.

 

[xfiler]

That's what I'm suspecting, that the ISP has installed a
third party software that did this previously - some
ISP's did send this type of software out with the
installation CD's (similar to the AOL coasters)to their
customers.

xfiler

 

[Numpty]

The lock pcBody was referring to has nothing to do with the connection
status icon in the tray. If you open your Network Connections window, any
connection that is firewalled will show a little padlock in the top-right
corner of the icon. This still applies after SP2, at least it does on this
machine.

 

[Sharon F]

The lock pcBody was referring to has nothing to do with the connection
status icon in the tray. If you open your Network Connections window, any
connection that is firewalled will show a little padlock in the top-right
corner of the icon. This still applies after SP2, at least it does on this
machine.

Hmm, you're right. I use "Details" view in this window and it does *not*
show a lock on the icon. So decided to try different views:

Details and List view show no lock icon.

All other views (thumbnail, icons or tile), show the lock icon.

Thanks for posting as I didn't realize there would be a different icon for
these items when using a different view.

 

[xfiler]

Learn something new every day!! Thanks for clearing that
up!

xfiler

 

[Numpty]

You're both welcome. I guess they decided to leave it off the smaller
versions of the icon because it wouldn't look lcear enough.