Random IE home page change even when group policy locked

[Guest]

Before I start, this is not a spyware issue. This is not a hijack issue. This
is not a virus issue. This is a group policy issue. Please answer accordingly.

Company wide, our IE homepage is set in group policy at a domain level to
our intranet and end users do not have permission to change the homepage. We
are having completely random instances where perhaps once per week, one
random workstation out of 42 (win2000 pro or Win XP with IE6 and either SP1
or SP2) directs its homepage to the default MSN page, in our instance, it
directs to http://ninemsn.com.au however the homepage address in the internet
options remains greyed out on our intranet address. The problem then stays
for a while then disappears of its own accord. We have not been able to
define any event which makes this problem appear or disappear.

Can someone please give me some thoughts on things to try to prevent this
occurring. Perhaps more regular Group Policy refreshes or even some way to
force the workstation to keep trying to load group policies if for some
reason an update fails rather than revert to a default setting?

Thanks
Ben

 

[Rob Parsons]

GDay M8,
Perhaps some users are choosing the option to Reset Defaults (Programs tab
on the Internet Options Dialog) which refreshes values stored under the HKLM
to the HKCU for Internet Explorer. Check the values for IE in the registry
under the HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Main (I think its the
Start Page value for the default home page) or even just scan an effected
machines registry for the ninemsn.com.au string - this will reveal where the
default value is being picked up from.

I'm not sure if gpedit.msc has options to set the default values. It does
have options to block access to the Programs tab of Internet Options. I know
that there are options in IEAK, but apart from that you should be able to
work out the changes to your adm scripts that will set the HKLM default
values for IE to be the same as the HKCU values (Probably just cut and paste
with a change to the Root node value for the registy entry)

Please post back to this thread if this is the solution.
"Sportscover IT Department"