Sharon, WinME is probably the culprit. Saving regularly is essential. I became very proficient at reformatting and reinstalling WinME about every 9 months. Several years back, even my shop guy said he regularly reinstalled Win98 and ME on his own personal computer. Since I've had a new computer with WinXP for about two years, I still can't get over not having everything go wacky on a regular basis and having to reinstall the OS. Even WinME's "restore" would stop restoring back in those days. XP and XP's "restore" has been performing flawlessly. Woody ++++++++++++++++++++++++++ sharonmc2002@aol.com writes: <<Okay, we know my software for my fax program disappeared but what would make internet explorer go crazy? I opened my desktop to do some work (windows me with AOL 9.0 SE) and get the message that my ie security settings do not allow active x to get into any of my programs. I went to ie and tried to locate my security settings which are suddenly blank and there are no custom settings available. Help!! Is my computer going off the deep end? There is no sign of viruses, spyware, or anyone breaching the firewall. Sharonmc2002>>