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August 18, 2004
Spies in the night.
I spent the better part of yesterday evening getting rid of some advertising spy ware that installed itself on my computer. The trouble is that the stuff is aggressive and starts up processes just simply by "visiting" a site now. No separate agreement is needed, just the visit to the address is enough implied permission to start installing rogue software. This is wrong and must be stopped!
Getting rid of it is like treatment for AIDS - there is no one spy bot killer that can get it all. I have a cocktail of three or more spy bot killers that seem to do the trick. One thing the killers do not do well is clear out the "hosts" file. That I had to do manually, and I checked the "read only" box as well for all the good that will do. The last thing I notice is that a lot of spy ware comes under the disguise of being a spy ware or virus killer. This kind of "fox guarding the chickens" approach is very stupid - but many fall for it.
It is a very American process, the make a dollar at any cost approach. That's why you have to watch TV with TiVo because of all the bloody commercials!
Posted by nezbitthecat at August 18, 2004 08:55 AM
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