ActiveX controls are a set of rules for how applications should share information. An ActiveX control can be automatically downloaded and executed by a Web browser. Programmers can develop ActiveX controls in a variety of languages, including C, C++, Visual Basic, and Java.

ActiveX is not a programming language but sets of rules that guide the way applications run on windows. Many a times you may have come across web sites that sometimes ask you to download ActiveX controls in order to run some of their downloadable programs. ActiveX controls have full access to the Windows operating system. ActiveX controls aresimilar to Java applets but the access to the Windows OS gives them much more power than Java applets, But there is a risk involved with this power, the applet may damage software or data on your machine. As a result, Microsoft has developed a registration system so that browsers can identify and authenticate an ActiveX control before downloading it. Downloading these controls enters them in the Registry of the system but after a period, these controls are actually not needed by the system for those programs. But these controls are there taking up space and slowing down the system so these controls need to be cleaned out from the registry.

Working of ActiveX controls

When the browser loads a web page that has embedded ActiveX components, the browser uses the ‘CLASSID’ information on the Web page’s ‘OBJECT’ statement to ascertain if the control is already present on your system. If not, the browser uses the ‘CODEBASE’ information to download the control and install it. Once you are done with the download it lodges in the system registry. It is not actually needed here but is there all the time. Downloading a free registry cleaner to clean the registry is one way to solve this problem of clogging up the registry with unwanted controls.

Safe Usability

Many programmers started embedding ActiveX components in their programs and web pages. It should be noted that ActiveX controls are capable of doing anything a normal Visual Basic program can. In other words they can seem to be linking to some program but may be malicious software. A Registry cleaner will help remove the installation from the registry. Because you never know what the ActiveX control has been programmed to do.

Security measures to differentiate between necessary and unwanted controls

Microsoft has provided some measure of security for identifiable ActiveX controls. This is achieved through a signature scheme. Designers of ActiveX controls digitally sign the ActiveX controls they author. When the user accesses a web page that uses that particular control, the user’s browser can verify the person that has signed it wrote the control.

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