Firewall and antivirus programs may cause problems in the communication between your computer and our servers, preventing you from participating in the survey. The following describes various related issues.

When participating from work:
when participating from work, or a public institution, a firewall program that the company uses may prevent communications to our servers. to solve this issue you will need to consult your system administrator.

Microsoft Windows XP - built in firewall windows
XP contains a built in firewall.

• To check if the firewall is enabled:
  • go to START -> CONTROL PANEL
  • from the control panel choose NETWORK AND INTERNET CONNECTIONS and then choose NETWORK CONNECTIONS at the bottom (if in classic display just go to NETWORK CONNECTIONS.)
  • choose the connection you connect to the Internet with and click on it once.
  • on the left hand side click on CHANGE SETTINGS FOR THIS CONNECTION.
  • a window opens. go to the ADVANCED tab. the upper section is the firewall section
    • No service pack 2 - if the firewall box is checked, the firewall is enabled.
    • Service pack 2 - Click on the SETTINGS button. in the new window if the firewall is set to ON, it's enabled.
      
      
• IMPORTANT Disabling the Firewall may help, however this means you are decreasing the protection level of your computer temporarily and therefore You may choose to do so at your own discretion.
  
  
• To disable firewall: Uncheck the firewall box, or, for Service Pack 2, set the radio button value to OFF.
  

Check for other running software in the icon tray:
Are you using a personal firewall? or any antivirus? Do you have 'Zone-alarm', 'Norton', 'McAfee', or any Pop-up blocker installed on your system? Do you see an icon on the bottom right hand side of your screen that might be a personal firewall or antivirus? Move your mouse pointer over the icon and the name of the application will pop up.

• IMPORTANT - Disabling the Firewall may help, however this means you are decreasing the protection level of your computer temporarily and therefore You may choose to do so at your own discretion.
  
  
• To disable:
  The icon should be located at the bottom right hand side of the screen (at the edge of the task bar). Right clicking on the icon and choosing "disable", "close", "exit" or "shut down" can usually disable it.
  NOTE - disabling Zone-alarm's firewall is not good enough, you have to shut it down completely!

Look for installed software using system information:
Check if you have any other software installed on your machine that in blocking communication to our servers

• Open the system information: click on "START" on the bottom left hand side of your screen, now go to Programs>Accessories>System Tools, and in the menu choose "System Information"
  
  
• Look at the program groups: In the new window, look at the left pane, expand the 'software environment' category, by clicking the PLUS sign next to it, and now select the 'Program Groups' sub-category. you should now see a list of all the installed software on the right pane.
  
  
• Search for conflicting software: please go over the list and look for the following words:
  Symantec
  Norton
  McAfee
  Zone Alarm
  Pop-up blocker
  
  
• IMPORTANT Disabling the software may help, however, this means you are decreasing the protection level of your computer temporarily and therefore You may choose to do so at your own discretion.