Hiding the Name.dll ActiveX Control

If you are working on a public-facing Internet site, you should be aware that SharePoint may show a particularly annoying message at the top of Internet Explorer like shown below (This website wants to run the following add-on: ‘Name ActiveX Control’ from ‘Microsoft Corporation’: If you trust the website and the add-on and want to allow it to run, click here…)

The message asks the user to run the Name.dll ActiveX Control add-on because the users don’t the SharePoint Server added to their trusted sites list. This control enables presence information to be displayed for authenticated users in SharePoint, and typically shows their availability in external Instant Messaging programs from inside SharePoint. Since anonymous users don’t really need this functionality you can turn off this message by using one of the following method:

• In SharePoint 2010 the message can be turned off from Central Administration –> Manage Web Applications –> General Settings. Simply set Enable the Person Names Smart Tag and Online Status for Members to No. This will turn off the presence information and remove the ActiveX message for the entire web application.
• Alternatively you can you can disable the message and functionality from a custom master page. Simply add the following code to your master page:

<script type=”text/javascript”>
    function ProcessImn(){}
    function ProcessImnMarkers(){}
</script>

This JavaScript code overrides the functions in SharePoint that cause this ActiveX message.