The best idea (IMHO)is to get a firewall. Many use the free personal version of ZoneAlarm. I used BlackIce. Other than that, there are utilities that will do this when surfing. Typically the ip is 'spoofed' to do what you are asking for. Sometimes it is referred to as anonymous web surfing. You can also hide your ip behind a proxy server.

IPHider used to work. I haven't used it in sometime so you'll have to give it a try or find someone that can vouch for it:

IPHider
http://66.246.106.243/kv4/pafiledb/pafiledb.php?action=file&id=204

Also SurfNow does it too but I have not used or tested this and I can not vouch for it:

http://www.loomsoft.com/index.php?section=download

You can test to see if your ip is hidden here:

http://www.showmyip.com/



>Hi everybody.
>
>Win98. Is there a way to "hide" myself when somebody is resolving hostnames, open ports scanning IP's in a Local Network?? I wish to hide myself (appearing as "Dead" or not resolving my hostname) but finding everybody when i scan for IP's.
>
>I renamed the file vnbt.386 to vnbt.bak so nobody can see me on LAN but, i can't resolve any hostnames when i look on LAN when i scan IP's.
>
>Is there a way to hide my connected status but still seeing everybody else???.
>
>Thanks in advance, pros.
>
>Jim.