29th March 2002

Fly into the danger zone if you will, but don't leave your system wide open. Internet Explorer's security settings are not to be taken lightly. If you're not disabling unsigned ActiveX controls, you could be (inadvertently) inviting disaster. By default, there are four zones which you may customize: Internet, Local intranet, Trusted sites, and Restricted sites. Where's the My Computer zone? Hidden. Uncovered from NEOWIN.NET, this particular tweak is primarily for security-conscious folks who use Internet Explorer 6.0. Locate 'HKEY_CURRENT_USER \ Software \ Microsoft \ Windows \ CurrentVersion \ InternetSettings \ Zones \ 0' in the system registry. "Flags" will be set to (33) by default. Double-click it to change that value to 1. Log off (or reboot) to see a new zone appear: My Computer. Turn this on only if you want to protect yourself from yourself - or possibly from other people in your household. Tampering with this particular zone may cause Windows functionality quirks, so I'd tread with caution. Again, a complete backup is always recommended before you change a system setting.