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Home Computing Security
Does your 2 Gigahertz PC with a broadband connection to the Internet
just crawl along? Does downloading a page give you enough time to fix
a cup coffee, in your percolator? When you type in a web address, is
there about a 5% chance you’ll get the right page?
If you answered ‘Yes’ to these questions, you may be a victim of spyware!
WHAT IS SPYWARE?
Spyware is a catch-all term for programs or cookies installed on your
computer (often without your knowledge) that usually have a negative
impact. They show ads, slows your computer’s performance, and cause
system instability.
Categories include:
* Adware networks - enables ad targeting – e.g.
DoubleClick, Web3000, Aureal/Radiate, and SaveNow
* Stalking horses - presents pop-up ads when you’re not online – e.g.
TopText, Delfin, WebHancer
* Trojan horses - incorporates the previous two categories - e.g.
KaZaa, Grokster, Morpheus, and AudioGalaxy
* Backdoor Santas - standalone pop-up ads and data collection – e.g.
BonziBuddy, eWallet, Alexa, and Hotbar
* Tracking Cookies - cookies that track your surfing habits and report
them by
‘phoning home’
* Browser Hijackers - redirect your page requests to ‘their’ own servers,
and
collecting revenue from it – e.g.
CoolWebSearch
* Dialers (dial up porn sites sticking you with long distance charges –
e.g.
OKMate, Online Timer, Alyon
OK – WHAT DO I DO?
The first thing you must do is acquire some programs that will search
your computer for these problems. I suggest using these three:
AdAware (http://www.lavasoftusa.com/software/adaware/)
Spybot Search & Destroy (http://www.safer-networking.org/en/download/
index.html)
and Pest Patrol (http://www.pestpatrol.com/Products/PestPatrolHE/).
Each will find things the others won't.
The first two are free; Pest Patrol will scan for free, but to get it to
fix
the problems, you must buy it (about $40). I would avoid any programs
that appear in pop-up ads, saying “you are infected” and they will fix it.
Many of these are themselves spyware!
Once you install them, run their update options. Better yet, have them
autoupdate when you start them! This will
fetch the latest definition files
to run (they change often). Then run
them, one at a time, and delete that
@)*$(#$ from your system. It is
not unusual to find hundreds of infections
on a single PC.
Once you finish scanning with Spybot, have it immunize your system.
While this won’t prevent all problems, it helps a lot. You can also go to
the TOOLS menu (the bars on the left), click on Resident, and under
Resident protection status, put a check in both boxes.
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