How do I block ads and pop-ups?

By using a simple trick. By editing a file called HOSTS you can competely block access to certain websites. Using this trick you can block websites that serve ads or onces that might compromize your privacy and security. This trick also speeds up the loading time of websites, because the ads don't have to be downloaded.

The Ad Block does this for you.

How exactly does the HOSTS file work?

The short answer is that the HOSTS file is like an address book. When you type an address like www.yahoo.com into your browser, the HOSTS file is consulted to see if you have the IP address, or "telephone number," for that site. If you do, then your computer will "call it" and the site will open. If not, your computer will ask your ISP's (internet service provider) computer for the phone number before it can "call" that site. Most of the time, you do not have addresses in your "address book," because you have not put any there. Therefore, most of the time your computer asks for the IP address from your ISP to find sites.

If you put ad server names into your HOSTS file with your own computer's IP address (Localhost: 127.0.0.1), your computer will never be able to contact the ad server. It will try to, but it will be simply calling itself and get sort of a "busy signal". Your computer will then give up calling the ad server and no ads will be loaded, nor will any tracking take place. Your choices for blocking sites are not just limited to blocking ad servers. You may block sites that serve advertisements, sites that serve objectionable content, or any other site that you choose to block. Also would it be possible to redirect a website to another website by using that website's IP adress in stead of your computers IP adress.

Where can I find that HOSTS file you are talking about?

This HOSTS file is located here:

NOTE: The HOSTS file does NOT have an extention (extensions are the .exe, .txt, .doc, etc. endings to filenames). HOSTS.sam is just an sample file, not the file you need to edit.

If you don't have a HOSTS file yet, then create an empty textfile and rename it to remove the .txt extension.

How can I edit the HOSTS file?

You can open the HOSTS file by right-clicking on it and selecting "open with". Then select Notepad.

After that you can edit it similar as you would with a normal text file.

How can I manually remove the Ad-Block?

Locate your hosts file and open it with Notepad. See the topics above on how to do that.

Now remove everything, except for the first two lines:

# localhost: Needs to stay like this to work
127.0.0.1 localhost

Save the file.

How to block a website/server:

Just add one or more lines to the hosts file like this:

127.0.0.1 desktop.kazaa.com

Just 127.0.0.1 followed by a space followed by the server you want to block

I have added those entries to the Hosts file, but I can see those sites/banners

Make sure you have put the hosts file in the correct location and that you have used the correct filename 'hosts' (no extension!!!)

Else, if you use a proxy server, then it bypasses the Hosts file. Do the following to let certain sites bypass the proxy and thus get blocked by the Hosts file:

Go to Internet Options. Click on the Connections tab. Select you connection and press on the settings button. Click on the Advanced button for the proxy settings. Now in the Exceptions field put the following (example):

ad.de.doubleclick.net;ad.doubleclick.net;media.fastclick.net

So just servers separated by semicolons.

How can I make blocked images invisible?

If you do not want to see an red cross (or a 'page not found' message) every time when an ad is blocked, try the eDexter program (see download page). It will replace the error message with an transparant image.