Cannot change homepage in Internet explorer.

[Albert]

Hello All,

I cannot change or reset my home page in Internet Explorer. When I
try to open "Tools" I get this message "This operation has been
canceled due to restrictions in effect on this computer. Please
contact your systems administrator." Also when I go into "Control
Panel","Internet options","General" in the home page box everything is
grayed out.

I am the only one that uses my computer with only one user account,
me. All of my Windows XP updates are current.

Any and all help would be greatly appreciated.

Albert

 

[Gordon Burgess-Parker]

Hello All,

I cannot change or reset my home page in Internet Explorer. When I
try to open "Tools" I get this message "This operation has been
canceled due to restrictions in effect on this computer. Please
contact your systems administrator." Also when I go into "Control
Panel","Internet options","General" in the home page box everything is
grayed out.

I am the only one that uses my computer with only one user account,
me. All of my Windows XP updates are current.

Any and all help would be greatly appreciated.

Albert

See if this helps:

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;320159&product=ie

 

[Albert]

Mr. Parker,

Thank you for your help but so far the URL that you sent me has not
helped. I am running Norton AntiVirus with complete updates and I do
not show to have a virus or a warm.

I am using Spybot S/D and may be that is the problem? I am going to
uninstall it and see if that helps.

Albert

 

[Jim Byrd]

Hi Albert - This has been showing up a lot lately and seems to be caused by
some malware called CoolWebSearch. Do the following:
Download and run: http://www.spywareinfo.com/~merijn/files/cwshredder.zip to
remove the parasite

Then download and run:
http://www.kellys-korner-xp.com/regs_edits/iegentabs.reg to restore your
tabs and remove any restrictions that the parasite has put in place.

However, this also indicates that you may have acquired some other malware
along the way. If you go to this page at Jim Eshelman's site, here:
http://aumha.org/a/noads.htm and wait a little bit (be patient), an analysis
of a number of possible parasites on your machine will be made to help you
identify and remove them. NOTE: You will need to disable Ad Blocking in Zone
Alarm 3.x, if present or any other Ad Blocking software which interferes
with Java Scripting for this scan to work. You should get a message between
the two lines of **** giving the results of the scan.

Get Ad-Aware 6.0, Build 181 or later, here:
http://www.lavasoftusa.com/support/download/. Update and run this regularly
to get rid of most "spyware/hijackware" on your machine.

Another excellent program for this purpose is SpyBot Search and Destroy
available here: http://security.kolla.de/ SpyBot Support Forum here:
http://www.net-integration.net/cgi-bin/forums/ikonboard.cgi. I recommend
using both normally. After fixing things with SpyBot S&D, be sure to re-boot
and rerun SpyBot again and repeat this cycle until you get a clean "no red"
scan.


Note that sometimes you need to make a judgement call about what these
programs report as spyware. See here, for example:
http://www.imilly.com/alexa.htm



--
Please respond in the same thread.
Regards, Jim Byrd, MS-MVP



In

 

[Albert]

Jim,
Thank you, http://www.spywareinfo.com/~merijn/files/cwshredder.zipof
did the trick. Although I have Ad-Aware and SpyBot Search and Destroy
they did not pick it up on either one of them and both of them are
updated. I only have the free Ad-Aware program.

I will try Jim Eshelman's site and see what happens.

Again, thank you very much you have been a great help,
Albert

 

[Jim Byrd]

YW, Albert - Glad it helped.

--
Please respond in the same thread.
Regards, Jim Byrd, MS-MVP



In

 

[Albert]

Jim,
Thank you, http://www.spywareinfo.com/~merijn/files/cwshredder.zipof
did the trick. Although I have Ad-Aware and SpyBot Search and Destroy
they did not pick it up on either one of them and both of them are
updated. I only have the free Ad-Aware program.

I will try Jim Eshelman's site and see what happens.

Again, thank you very much you have been a great help,
Albert

 

[Jim Byrd]

YW Albert. Glad it straightened it out for you.

--
Please respond in the same thread.
Regards, Jim Byrd, MS-MVP



In