Spyware

[fishfreek]

Some interesting observations.

As most konw I work in the IT department at a college. We see kids bringing their systems in with THOUSANDS of adware enteries every single day. Whats sad is some are 'frequent visitors' for the exact same issues.

I just checked my two home systems for the first time in what must be 6 months. On my systems I think I had a total of 60 'tracking cookies'. Not that big of a deal.

Honstly I wonder how these kids can get so much so fast.

 

[millipede]

"Honstly I wonder how these kids can get so much so fast."
Some of that has to do with what kind of activity they are doing and frequency of visits to sites and such. Personally I believe modem type has some affect on things as well. When you have cable or dsl you're connected all the time and things transfer as a much higher speed.
I leave all cookies turned off on my pc. I make exceptions for certain sites that wont work without them. Like this one. If I don't have this listed in my trusted sites and allow cookies then I can't go from one page to another without being logged off... But even with the lenghts I go to to keep cookies off I still have a few from time to time.
Just a side note, the people who make this spyware pretty much disgust me. Internet crime is so pointless/useless. Anyone have any idea what the penalties are for that sort of thing(I sure hope it's not a slap on the wrist)and how many people are ever actually caught? Well, I guess the legal issue probably applies to viruses more than spyware. I'm not sure if spyware is illegal, but if it isn't , it should be.

 

[Jchillin]

From what I understand, it began with cookies (websites wanted to "ease" the user's ability to browse their sites). The cookies then became "tracking" cookies (spyware) to deliver ad messages (pop-ups) every so often to entice user's to return to a site in the hopes of making purchases or delivering new products.

Once that happened, the floodgates were unleashed and is the massive problem it is today. Some of these will actually change your homepage, install search/toolbars and other nasties.

Yuck and double yuck!

 

[youronlysin]

I use Panicware Pop-up Stopper free edition, Spybot Search and Destroy and the windows XP security. Thats it. I dont see the point of having a hundred different programs running in the background at all times. I block what I can, my computer is slow enough as it is, all of the security and protection junk really just bogs it down even more. When I had pop-ups left and right, at least my computer was still fast. I dont know whats worse. Either way, it all slows everything down. Ok..Im donr ranting now.

 

[millipede]

I'm not familiar with panicware but the gogodata adbuster works really well for me. When I decide on a program I really read reviews carefully before I use them. My dad might suggest a program to me, and he knows computers real well, but I still check out all the reviews before I chose. I usually get my software from download.com. I check to see if they have their own review and I also see what users thought of the product.
I know what you mean about bogging your system down with too much... I've been a bit leery about anything with the microsoft name on it as I have this odd feeling they are tracking people more than anyone else, especially with all the new xp stuff... I could be wrong, but I doubt my paranoia will cause me any harm

 

[jenpc]

You have to watch out. Some of the spyware programs are actually spyware. Ad-aware and spybot are the best we have found.

 

[fishfreek]

My comments about how they get all the stuff was kind of a figure of speach. I know where it comes from but still I have no idea how someone can get so much of it so quickly. The simple fact of being online isnt it. My home pc's are always connected to the net and never get powered off. In all honesty my home connection is faster (on average) than our students dorm connections.

Oh and as far as internet virus writters, spyware programmers, etc being prosicuted. You dont hear about iton the news much cause it does not happen much.

 

[deli_conker]

I know where it comes from but still I have no idea how someone can get so much of it so quickly.

Decompile some of the software that gets installed and you'll find out...

Javascript and peer to peer sharing software are by far the worst culprits.

 

[reefrunner69]

Well I ended up going with spybot and spysweeper. The fellow is handicapped and doesn't really keep up with his subscriptions, his virus scan was also expired. I recommended to his care giver that he purchase a license for the spysweeper and renew the virus scan and set them to run automatically when he is usually asleep. The reason I went with the spysweeper was it's ability to be scheduled to update and run automatically with no intervention from him.

 

[Jchillin]