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WinPatrol FAQ

What is a HOSTS file?

Are you getting repeated messages about your HOSTS file changing?
If you're using the program Spy Sweeper we know they also monitor the HOSTs file so having both programs doing is redundant. I would suggest turning off HOSTs monitoring on either WinPatrol or SpySweeper.

To disable HOST monitoring click on the Options tab in WinPatrol. On this page you'll see a check box in front of the text "Warn if changes are made to my Internet HOSTs file..". Uncheck this box or on newer versions set the Patrol Time to 0. This will stop Scotty from checking the HOSTs file.
If Spy Sweeper or some other AntiSpyware program is taking care of it, you don't need WinPatrol to duplicate the issue and the alert boxes will go away.