Where do Pop-Ups Come From?

The first thing that should be realized is that if you are being inundated with pop-up ads, you should first check your computer for ad-ware or Spyware. Sometimes programs running in the background will create pop-ups based on the websites you visit. You can use a number of free programs such as "Spybot Search and Destroy" or "Ad-aware" by Lavasoft. Look up either of these products in a search engine for more information. Legitimate websites are not going to annoy you with more than one or two ads because they want you to come back to their site. Whereas sites that are offering things for free will load up the pop-up ads because that is how they make money.

Pop-Up Blockers

There really is no need to pay for a pop-up blocker because there are so many free ones that do the job well. Also, many browsers already come with pop-up blockers built in. Netscape, Mozilla and Internet Explorer (Service Pack 2) all have blockers already built in.

Then there are the "Toolbars" that people like to install or in many cases do not realize they were installed with something else that they have downloaded. Most all toolbars also have a built in pop-up blocker. Some of the more popular toolbars are Google, Yahoo! and the AOL toolbar. MySearch is an example of a toolbar that is downloaded pretty much without the user's knowledge and you may have better luck figuring out who killed JFK than you will trying to uninstall the program. Many toolbars have great features and their pop-up blockers can be very effective, but you just need to educate yourself on how to use them properly. Some anti-virus programs have blockers built in as well such as Norton Internet Securities. There are also hundreds of other pop-up blockers that you can pay for, but again, I say why bother when there are so many legitimate free ones.