Article by George Norman

On 29 Oct 2009

It is important to protect your privacy in day-to-day life – in the real world and in the virtual world of the internet. In the case of Yahoo! Messenger, there are several ways to protect your privacy; one of these include the option to ignore certain users.

I love the fact that I can talk to people millions of miles away via Yahoo! Messenger. I especially love the fact that I can audio and video chat with other Yahoo! Messenger. And I supremely love the fact that with Yahoo! Messenger you can send free SMS messages and you can call landline and mobile phones (this last one is not free; available only if you set up a Phone Out account).


Sometimes, though I don’t like the fact that Bob from the other end of the world can IM me at all hours of the day. I don’t like Bob all that much and I’m tired of reading his spam-like messages. So I’m going to add him to the ignore list.

Here’s how:

Step 1. Launch Yahoo! Messenger -> sign into Yahoo! Messenger.

Step 2. Look for Bob in the contacts list. The goal here is to see Bob’s Messenger ID, so right click his name -> select Contact Details -> in the bottom left hand corner of the screen copy Bob’s Messenger ID -> close the Contact Details window.

Step 3. Remove Bob from your Contacts list by right clicking his name -> select Delete ->confirm your actions by clicking Yes.

Step 4. Click Messenger (the top left hand corner) -> in the dropdown menu that appears select Preferences.

Step 5. In the Yahoo! Messenger Preferences window -> under Category -> click Ignore List -> click Add -> paste Bob’s ID -> click Ignore -> click Apply -> click OK and you’re done.

Tips and warnings

• If you already know the Messenger ID or the email address of the person you want to add to the Ignore List, you can skip step 2.
• You can replace all the clicking in step 3 with a handy keyboard shortcut: Ctrl + Shift + P. Check out a detailed list of Yahoo! Messenger keyboard shortcuts here.
• When you get to the Ignore List (step 5), you can select Ignore everyone who is not on my Messenger List. Anyone who you’ve removed from your contacts list will automatically be ignored. This way you can simply remove someone from your list and he or she will be ignored.
• Contacts in the Ignore List will see you as unavailable.
• Learn how to remove people from the Ignore List here.

Tags: Yahoo!, Yahoo! Messenger, Instant Messaging, IM, Privacy, Ignore List

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