Helping people with computers... one answer at a time.
About:blank is a special page within most browsers. It can appear due to problems, malware, or if there's been malware that's been removed.
I'm too dumb to understand the "Dummies" books. I think I am running Windows 7. I get the "about:blank" whenever I log on IE. I didn't even know it was a 'whatever' until recently. What is a simple, fool-proof way to get rid of it?
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I almost discarded this question because it starts with one of the things that frustrates the heck out of me.
Please: never, ever refer to yourself as too dumb.
You're admitting defeat before you even start and that really makes it difficult for me or people like me to get enthused about even thinking about your question.
I don't care who you are – you're not too dumb.
With that mini-rant out of the way, let's talk about about:blank – it
confuses many people (who, by the way, aren't dumb 
).
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About about:blank
About:blank isn't really "about" anything.
The word "about:" is just a keyword that many browsers use as a way to enable some additional functionality or display standard pages. You can read more about about: in this Wikipedia article.
About:blank does nothing more than display a blank page.
That's all. Just a blank page.
Most browsers have to display something in the browser window and IE is no different. In various situations, when IE can't figure out anything else to display, it might well display about:blank.
Sometimes, it's malware
No, about:blank isn't malware, but sometimes, it's a sign of malware.
Occasionally, malware will explicitly mess with IE and cause it to display about:blank.
More frequently, malware will effectively break something and IE will be unable to display a page, and thus revert to displaying about:blank.
The solution in most of these cases, of course, is to run up-to-date scans for malware.
Sometimes, the malware (or other errors) may leave you with a persistent about:blank like you might be seeing.
About:blank as your browser home page
Your browser home page is the page that you see first when you initially fire up your browser.
Frequently, the default home page for IE is http://www.msn.com or some other Microsoft-related property.
Sometimes, malware or other misfortune can leave your browser configured with about:blank as the home page that displays whenever you start IE.
Let's fix that.
Click the gear icon (or the Tools menu) and then Internet options.
On the very first tab (the General tab), the setting for home page is at the very top. As you can see above, it's set to be about:blank.
It can be whatever web page you want it to be.
Let's say you want it to be "http://ask-leo.com". Simply type
that in, overwriting the about:blank:
After entering whatever it is you want, click OK.
Now, click the Home button in IE.
Now, your browser will open whatever page it is that you've specified when you click the Home button and when you first open the browser.
Article C5362 - May 20, 2012 « »
Leo A. Notenboom has been playing with computers since he
was required to take a programming class in 1976. An 18 year career as a programmer at Microsoft soon followed.
After "retiring" in 2001, Leo started Ask Leo! in 2003 as a place for answers
to common computer and technical questions. More about Leo.
June 3, 2012 9:37 AM
I'm not a real dummy, but I've portrayed one more than once. Such as just last week when, for no apparent reason, Chrome changed my "Open browser to" settings. I couldn't remember if it was supposed to be aboutblank, about.com or blank.com. About.com was a website, but the next one I tried (blank.com) gave me the blank page I wanted so I went with it. Within a week my browser was being misdirected to some Spanish-language gaming site and I got a malware alert. I ran a full scan, got rid of it, then told the IT son about it. "ABOUT BLANK, Mom, ABOUT BLANK." : ) There are those who know, those who don't, and those who know just enough to be dangerous. sigh
June 3, 2012 9:54 AM
@Joy
Just for the record, it's about:blank. Punctuation is important ;=)
June 6, 2012 3:14 PM
@Mark
See what I mean? : ) Thanks
June 6, 2012 7:21 PM
@Joy,
You might want to get that IT son to take a look at your computer for malware. Things shouldn't be changing like that on it!
February 3, 2013 10:00 AM
I ABSOLUTELY HATE ABOUT:BLANK. I have had nothing but problems with that darn thing. Everytime I get rid of it, it pops up again. Isn't there something out there that completely gets rid of it???? PLEASE???