Kill them with fire.

Oh, and Happy New Year.

I'M willing to bet that a large number of you are running an Internet Explorer that looks less like this, and more like this.

The first image is how your browser should look. The second is how it does look in many cases. Yes, these are toolbars. Toolbars are evil.

They add little more than mostly-redundant "features", corporate branding, occassionally monitor and record the sites you most frequently visit, and sometimes cause Internet Explorer to crash or take a while to start up.

Where do they come from?

Most free software programs nowadays come bundled with extra toolbar software that installs itself by default. At some point during the installation, you will be faced with a series of checkboxes. These options may do anything from change your homepage to another popular search provider, install said provider's toolbar software, or add shortcut icons on to your desktop to visit websites. In some extreme cases they throw up intrusive adverts over the top of your window.

Naturally, the developers of the free program do earn some commission on these uninvited extras, which is frequently one way that they supplement their income in order to provide their software for free. Many of these free programs are good, and shouldn't be tainted by the poor quality of the extra pieces of software that they had no hand in designing and merely rely on for income.

Why?

To help the user and make their internet experience more reliable and enjoyable.

To create corporate awareness and boost market share, of course. Whichever toolbars you have installed will give you "easy" access to one particular organisations "services", encouraging you to use their search facility, their email, their news feeds, and so on.

You will of course be exposed to their corporate logo consistently throughout the process, creating an almost subconscious recognition and trust of this company's brand and logo.

HOW CAN I REMOVE THEM?

I'm glad you asked. It isn't difficult.

First, let's bring up the list of installed "Add-ons" loaded in Internet Explorer.

Examine the list that comes up. Click each entry in the list, and click the "Disable" button for anything that you do not want or do not recognise.

This is what my own list looks like for a relatively clean and quick Internet Explorer with only a few add-ons installed. Nothing is actually required in the list.

Personally speaking, the only ones I would leave enabled are Adobe Flash (required for YouTube and the likes) and any download managers that are installed.

When you have disabled most/all of the undesirables, restart the browser.

Phew. How can I avoid them in future?

Don't just blindly click "Next" when installing software. Seriously. It's that simple.

If you read the text in each window and properly customise your installation, you will always be given the option of de-selecting the extra software before the software installs.

Do not install things you do not need or want. If you want Yahoo Messenger... install Yahoo Messenger. Do not install Yahoo Messenger with Yahoo Toolbar, Yahoo E-mail, Yahoo Browser Services, Yahoo Branded Toilet Paper, Yahoo Bedsheets and Yahoo Magic Beans.

An Evil Add-on has changed my homepage.  How do I change it back?

Firstly...

Then...

Type a new address into the box to specify a site, in this case we have Google UK; or click "Use current" to set it to the currently loaded webpage; or click "Use default" to simply set it to the MSN UK homepage.  "Use blank" will open a blank white page as the home page.

Click "OK".

Happy surfing.

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