message about probloem with workbook links keeps coming up. Help?

Every time I open my workbook a message comes up saying...

"This workbook contains links to other data source's.
If you update the links, Excel will attempt to retrieve the latest data.
If you don't update the links, Excel will use the previous information.

Note that data links can be used to access and share confidential information without your permission and possibly perform other harmful actions. Do not update the links if you do not trust the source of the workbook."

I'm having trouble understanding this. Any help would be great, this is a work computer so worried that it could cause problems to the data.

Dave

Hi,

It simply means that somewhere in your workbook you have a formula or something which contains a reference to another workbook.
It's not necessarily an error or problem, it may just be the case that whoever designed the workbook has decided to pick up data from another workbook.

If you think there should be no links at all then you can remove them easily with the Data..Edit Links..Break link functionality, but before doing that you need to be sure that they are not required. Personally I prefer to see where they are before unilaterally breaking them.

Often this is a formula that contains square brackets [] with a workbook name inside, so the first thing to do to find a link is to select all the cells on a sheet (use the little square at the intersection of the row numbers and column letters) and do a Find for the [

If this fails to find a formula link on one of the sheets then the link may be in a named range. So look through the defined range names to see if any of those point to an external workbook. If you don't find any links there, then sometimes there will be a picture or shape icon which contains a reference to another workbook.

Hope this helps