Website blocking

[Quartermaster]

Is there a way to block websites from your own computer?

[Random]

There are a variety of programs you can use for this kind of stuff; netnanny and AOL come to mind.

There are others, too, though, so you may want to look that up.

Alternativly, if you just want to block one or two certain websites, and it won't be anyone too smart trying to unblock it, there is an easy way.

Basically, open C:\Windows\system32\drivers\etc and open hosts file.
(I'm assuming you're using Windows. If you're using Linux, you'll hopefully know where your hosts file is.)

Then, add the name of the site at the bottom, go tab, and enter an IP of a safe site (if you can't think of any, add "127.0.0.1" without quotes; it just won't load a page at all.

[Quartermaster]

Thanks for your help, what do I open "hosts" with?

[Random]

Notepad.
Generally speaking, notepad will open any file with an odd extension.

[Frankey-eh]

to bring this topic back up from the grave, but I also want to block sites, and I've found my host file, but I don't know how to get the IP address. Can you give me an example by using Google as the website?

[whispering]

Can you give me an example by using Google as the website?
http://www.whois.sc type google.com to it.

Anyway, if your using F-Secure internet security, you can block sites with that too, if i remember right.

[finalz]

or u can use
start>run>cmd> ping www.google.com
there it will have the webaddress and some other information
u can use any webaddress but u must type it as u cannot copy anything into the command prompt.

[Frankey-eh]

Thank you so much.

But now, when I try to write onto hosts, it says I can't? Is it because I'm not logged in as an admin? And also, the top of the file says "This is a sample HOSTS file used by Microsoft TCP/IP for Windows." So where's the real host file?

[Spaatz965]

I believe you do need administrator level permissions to write to the hosts file. If you are logged in with a USER or POWER USER level account, you might not be able to write to it. Also, there are some Anti-Virus/Anti-Spyware products that will prevent writing to the hosts file.

The file you looked at is the HOSTS file. That text is in there just to help you understand how to populate the file.

[Random]

Yeah, you also don't need an IP for the website.
The entry should be:
127.0.0.1 google.com
127.0.0.1 other website you want to block
127.0.0.1 more sites

Like that.
Note that you need to press tab <above caps lock> between the IP and the website name.