The Imaginary Web Server makes the attackers think that they have found a web server which is no longer active. When they come to your computer, the server will give them an error message and send them to some imaginary place on the web. Now, don't worry, you will not be sending them to some unsuspecting web site! Whiz Kid Technomagic has secured the imaginaryplace.com domain and delegated the some.imaginaryplace.com subdomain, so they will, indeed, find the "new" location of "your" web site. They will go there and leave your computer in peace.

Meanwhile, your computer remains perfectly safe from these attackers. No matter what file they try to access on your computer, no matter what command they try to execute on your computer, your Imaginary Web Server always reacts the same way. It never lets them access the inside of your computer but always sends them off.

Some attackers try a different approach. Instead of trying to get to your files, they try to upload files to your system. Often these are scripts or programs they want to run on your computer. The Imaginary Web Server will, again, tell them there no longer is anywhere left to upload files on your system and will send them away. Some attackers try to upload huge files, just to keep your system busy and to slow down your Internet access. The Imaginary Web Server just shuts the door on them. Other attackers try to sneak in a hidden web server on your system and let that server cooperate with the attackers. But only one web server can exist on your computer. With the Imaginary Web Server running, they cannot run. And if they manage to start running first, the Imaginary Web Server will tell you that another web server is already running (see the image in the upper right corner), so you can find it and disable it.

Under normal circumstances, the Imaginary Web Server stays completely out of your way. Once it is installed on your system, it runs automatically, even after you restart your computer. If an attacker tries to access a web server on your system, the Imaginary Web Server will send him away as described above. If some software tries to open up its own web server, it will fail. And if it installs itself and run as soon as Windows boots up and before it loads the Imaginary Web Server, you will see the error message and know that some software created a secret web server. That is the only time you will hear from the Imaginary Web Server.

If, some day you decide that you want to run a real web server on your system, simply uninstall the Imaginary Web Server and reboot your computer. If you only want to disable the Imaginary Web Server temporarily, press ctl-alt-delete. Windows will present you with the Windows Task Manager. Select imaweb.exe from the Processes section of the Manager and click on End Process. The Imaginary Web Server will stop running. It will start running again once you restart Windows. Of course, if you uninstall it, it will be gone completely and not run again (unless you reinstall it).

Any time you want to make sure that the Imaginary Web Server is really running, open your web browser and type http://localhost in the address window. Just about every modern computer is automatically configured to refer to any local server as localhost. Alternately, you can just type in http://127.0.0.1, which, again, is your computer's own IP address. Either address is visible only to your computer. And if Imaginary Web Server is running on your computer, it will tell your browser to go to some imaginary place, and it will. That is how you can test whether the Imaginary Web Server is properly installed and running on your computer.

And feel free to test that the Imaginary Web Server always sends away anyone who is trying to sneak in on you. No matter what tricks they try: http://127.0.0.1/cmd.exe, http:127.0.0.1/../../../", or even http://127.0.0.1/cgi-bin/default.asp, it will always, always, always send them away from your computer. Of course, this only works if you have the Imaginary Web Server installed on your system. Otherwise, if you are lucky, any of those links will just fail. If you are not lucky, however, all bets are off. You may be lucky today, and not tomorrow. Do not take your chances, download the Imaginary Web Server now and install it on your computer.