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Is there any chance you are running Paralells or VMWare? That might account for the PC share.

You do realize that you're responding to a poster that started this thread 2 years ago? I think he's fixed his issue by now. ;)
 
This problem has just started on my Mac and my Dads.

I shutdown yesterday evening whist still connected to his machine. He got a message telling him that the connection had been lost - no big deal.

Now I can see his computer name and NetBIOS name in my finder and he can see my computer name and NetBIOS name in his finder. Our shared printer no longer works and I can't seem to get rid of these damn NetBIOS PC Server aliases.

Can anyone help?

I've tried the usual: Repair permissions from a Boot Disc, Mac Janitor. Messed about with the Sharing settings and Network settings.

No joy. And the shared printer's still not working!!
 
I'm having this issue as well. I'm not sure if my internet is encrypted but I have noticed at times the shared computers stay connected even if I turn off my wifi. What could this mean? I have Leopard and I have recently downloaded uTorrent so I'm a little paranoid. Also can these other shared computers access my computer information because I have a lot of private financial files from my company on my computer? Also if these are just people mooching off my internet can they access my computer files too?
 
I have the same thing, it turns out it is only the print-server that is activated on the imac we have at home. Turn off all services except file sharing in the Sharing pref pane and it will go away. Btw, mine to is a mac####### kind name.
 
Same problem - no answer yet

In the sidebar under Shared, is an entity that I don't use and to my knowledge is not attached to any computer that I currently am using. Under info it shows Kind: as a PC Server so I think that at one time I used this from one of my VMWare Fusion machines. Anyway I have tried dragging it to trash but it won't go. I have also gone to each of my Fusion machines and checked Network and Sharing under Control Panel and could not find such an entity. I have Fusion completely shut down but this still shows in my sidebar. I tried to remove it using Terminal (UNIX Commands) rmdir jwl-mcl but it was not considered to be a directory. I have restarted my MacPro but that didn't work. It must be considered a Bonjour computer because when I uncheck Bonjour in Finder>Sidebar>Preferences it (as well as all of my shared entries) goes away. Any help would be greatly appreciated.
 
In the sidebar it says macXXXXXXXXXXXX, right? MAC addresses have 12 digits, right? Compare the numbers to the MAC address of anything connected to your network.

I have an iMac that shows up as an iMac and this odd-looking macXXXXXXXXXXXX. Turns out the X's were the MAC address of the iMac. Don't know why it shows up or how to fix it, but it's definitely not someone mooching off your network. As someone above posted, it probably has something to do with the sharing preferences.

EDIT: Here's a thread I made way back. May help a bit.
 
Solution!

I found the solution. I found a computer on mine, some guy with a name Ali Sherwood. Seemed a bit odd. I am at a hostel, though.

I turned it off by opening up:

Finder > Finder Preferences > Uncheck the following- "Back to my MAC", "Connected Servers", "Bonjour Computers"

Hope it solves the issue for all!
 
Finder Preference and turn off Bonjour

Just open finder and view the shared computers.
goto finder preferences and the disable Bonjour computers to disable.

:) Actually, this advice worked for me well after Lion OS X.
Since I have this Lion, I see the Shared User.

But what I really don't understand is, can the other use see mine and perhaps get access to my MacBook, even though mine is turned off? Does anyone know? I don't want to share my Mac Content with others.:confused:
 

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I found the solution. I found a computer on mine, some guy with a name Ali Sherwood. Seemed a bit odd. I am at a hostel, though.

I turned it off by opening up:

Finder > Finder Preferences > Uncheck the following- "Back to my MAC", "Connected Servers", "Bonjour Computers"

Hope it solves the issue for all!

I'm pretty sure you didn't bump the other computer off. You just hid it. The preference is merely asking if you want to show other devices. Could be that what you did was sort of like turning up the radio loud enough so you no longer hear the nasty squeak your car is making.

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Great thread, please keep participating as new people with this problem are finding this thread via a Google search and jumping in.

I've got two devices both showing up as shared computers on my MacPro. They both have icons that look like monitors. One is "dell01183" and the other is just "max." I've bumped them off with restarts, but they show back up again fairly quickly. FWIW, I do not own anything that is dell.

I have NO wireless network operating on my computer right now. Normally I do maintain an undiscoverable network using airport (in other words, if you walked into my house my network does not show up as a wifi option, you have to actually know the name of it and type in the name and the password to access it). Right now wifi is turned off and my MacPro is getting internet directly from the phone line / modem. And, wifi on the MacPro is turned off so I can't discover/access any of my neighbor's networks (visible but password protected).

Running 10.7.3

I opened the file sharing preference pane and starting playing around. I originally had the first four sharing preferences ticked (DVD or CD sharing, Screen Sharing, File Sharing and Printer Sharing). Playing around with those, un-clicking them immediately dropped the icons off the sidebar. With file sharing only the laptop had been given access to file sharing but the printer sharing had said "Everyone." Now I've changed "Everyone" to "no access" for the printer. Normally, when I restart the icons would have reappeared by now. They haven't since I unchecked the various boxes, so hopefully that means the other computers are gone for now. Fingers crossed.

Dang. Re-appeared. But in the meantime found this article; maybe that will do the trick.
 
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If someone was mooching off the network would it show up as a volume that he could access in finder?

Not necessarily. A Windows machine with File and Print sharing turned on will announce itself on the network even if it doesn't have a volume shared.
 
Another way to see who might be viewing your data

I know this is a rather old thread but I think the following info might be useful for folks wondering about who might have access to their drives/files/computer(s). I think this info is available at least back to Snow Leopard, maybe further back. Hope it helps. :)
 

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Also had the unknown sharing "computer" but found out why...

This is an old thread that I'm responding to but it comes up in Google searches for why an unknown computer shows up under Sharing in the sidebar of OS X Mountain Lion.

Finally found out what was causing it. I run Parallels and several times now I've been prompted to install a new update that I have wanted to put off until later. Today I started Parallels and it asked me is I wanted to install the update and I clicked yes. Once that was done, the phantom sharing "computer" disappeared from the sidebar.
 
Another possible cause

A similar thing occurs when the Computer Name field in Sharing preferences is empty. As a result your Mac will appear in Finder as "Mac-AB1234567889" (or similar) instead of "computername". The solution is to fill in the Computer Name field.

(Context: I had been having a problem with wifi connectivity. The fix for the wifi issues was to clear the System Preferences folder in ~/Library. This reset all network settings, including Computer Name, which caused the issue described in this thread.)
 
I was able to get rid of one that seemed to have been operating through Microsoft Silverlight by deleting it.
 
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