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How do I disable the "remember me" feature of Instant Messaging clients?

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I run a Cyber Cafe and my customers log into their MSN/Yahoo Messenger account - sometimes they check in the "save username and password" or other variations of "remember me". I need to disable that feature - how?

One the most common classes of questions I get has to do with people who've lost access to their own accounts because someone else changed their password. Setting "remember me" on a public computer is a quick way to set yourself up for having your password changed and your account stolen.

I laud your efforts to help prevent this.

Sadly, the news isn't all that good.

I could find no official way in either MSN Instant Messenger, or Yahoo Instant Messenger to disable this feature. One would think that with the rampant problems it can cause, there would be a documented way for people in exactly your position to so.

"I could find no official way ... to disable this feature. "

However, I didn't stop there.

Unfortunately, I could not come up with a way to coerce MSN Instant Messenger into disabling the feature. Similarly, with Yahoo Instant Messenger, I thought I had a line on a registry setting that could be tweaked, or perhaps permissions on a registry setting could be altered to prevent it from being changed, but alas ... my experiments failed.

I'm hopeful that perhaps a reader will report back with a hack I've missed, or perhaps even an officially supported mechanism that I overlooked.

But for now, you'll have to rely on your clients to "do the right thing" ... which I know you can't really count on.

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Article C2501 - December 24, 2005

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Recent Comments
14 Comments

The fix for this is to use control panel, user accounts, then selcet your user name. then under related tasks in the left pane select manage my network passwords. From there remove the offending user account. problem solved.

Posted by: kathleen at December 4, 2006 9:32 AM

I agree with JM (at February 24, 2006 10:21 AM) about the use of Microsoft Shared Computer Toolkit (called today SteadyState). I didn't know about it before reading this page, but now i am sure i am going to use it.

Thanks!!!

Posted by: David Salinas Cortés at August 23, 2007 1:24 AM

how did i clear my email address on window massanger.

Posted by: hj.saini at March 21, 2008 2:58 AM

how do enable messenger to start automatically when logging in?

Posted by: Jennifer at January 20, 2009 12:10 PM

YOUR FIX FOR KEEPING MSN BROWSER FROM OPENING DOES NOT WORK

Posted by: L J BIASOTTO at September 26, 2009 4:00 PM

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