Thanks, blackbird. I have now fixed that. FWIW I think the thinking behind the standard is flawed, and that its stated aim is probably unachievable - disallowing the target attribute has certainly not achieved it

I made the change and no longer saw the problem. Interestingly, when I undid the change I still didn't see the problem. Unfortunately I didn't think to check immediately before making it so don't know whether, perhaps, the simple act of replacing a file on the server may have triggered something.

I will keep an eye on the situation, and will ask my hosting company whether they have any ideas. Meanwhile I would be interested if anybody knows anything that might have been the cause. If not, I will have to put it down as being a one-off due to some unusual circumstances but that doesn't entirely make me feel comfortable.

After posting this it occurred to me that the cause of the problem may be my own site and that removing the site from my speed dial just hides the symptom. It is pretty unlikely that anyone else would want to have my site on their speed dial but if they did and it triggered the same issue, they would probably be unaware and I would be unable to resolve the situation, so I really do need to know what is happening - and nothing to do with what browser I use. Alternatively, it is possible that I am causing the problem on someone else's site and remaining blissfully unaware.

The parameters may be slightly different, but my question remains the same ... Has anybody seen this before, or have any clues what may be happening?

I have just installed Opera 23 on a new installation of Windows 7. So far what has been my favourite browser (I was previously running version 12) is disappointing. I do, however, have a serious problem and can find noting similar by searching here or on the web, but that may well be my incompetence at searching.

One item on my speed dial (my own web site - www.WordArticles.com) is repeatedly requesting the page. For all I know this may affect other pages but I was triggered to investigate by warnings from my host. I left Opera open yesterday - as I usually do because the speed dial is pretty useless if it's not available - and in the last 24 hours my page has been requested 133,000 times. When I remove it from the speed dial the page requests stop; when I reinstate it, the page requests start again so there is absolutely no doubt that the trigger is simply having the thumbnail on the speed dial.

Has anybody seen this before, or have any clues what may be happening? If I can't fix this, it will be the end of my ten year affair with the browser.