Re: How do I get rid of this annoying site
From: Shenan Stanley (news_helper_at_hushmail.com)
Date: 11/21/04
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Date: Sun, 21 Nov 2004 10:53:58 -0600
Answers/comments inline..
Alan wrote:
> I complement you on your thoroughness but there are some limitations
> I must speak about.
Thanks and I am reading it now..
> The less you have installed on your system that is too closely
> related the better off you are. In other words you ownly need one
> antivirus progam as other programs start tripping all over each other
> and your registry is forced into a total conflictive mess. One
> firewall will do also and no more than one engaged. One registry
> cleaner and make sure it knows what it is doing. The best I have seen
> on the market is free for the basic version and that is Tweak your
> registry entries. Very safe and not dangerous as a lot of system
> utility programs that have too many functions that are not addressed
> very carefully.
You are correct, you should only have one antivirus application installed at
any given time. I wish that antispyware applications were at that point,
but they are not. What one antispyware applications misses, the next one
may find. Same for immunization from spyware - although IE-SpyAd is pretty
comprehensive. Firewalls - I definitively agree. If you are going to run a
software firewall, choose one and only one. I list the options I do (for
antivirus and firewall) so someone might know the options they have with
minimal research effort in the beginning. However, I see the point being
made here - that it should be pointed OUT that you should not run multiple
firewalls/antivirus applications - as they may cancel one another out.
Registry cleaning - here is where we may differ. For Windows XP, at least -
I find this to be archaic and unnecessary. If there is any performance
increase from cleaning your registry, the normal human mind (not on crack)
is not likely to notice the nanosecond per day they gain - if that. Windows
XP and uninstallers in general (for good applications) do a decent job -
better than in the past - of clearing unneeded entries when they are removed
from the system - IMHO.
> Next thing is Spyware Blaster is dangerous when you get the updates
> as not everything is engaged and when I was running Norton Internet
> Security 2005 it obliterated practically all the registry entries
> because it uses the registry for spyware prevention. Spybot Search
> and Destroy is too infrequently updated although it has wonderful
> advanced features to it that are quite useful.
Interesting. I have had no ill effects with SpywareBlaster or IE-SpyAd when
running it on the many systems I have.. Admittedly - only a few have had
Norton Internet Security 2005. As SpywareBlaster also works with Firefox,
this is definitely a plus for me! I love Firefox and know that IE is not
"going away", so having a program that understands I have both...
fantastic. SpyBot Search and Destroy is too inffrequently updated? Hmmm..
That may be true for some, but it is another reason to use AdAware and the
other applications I list as well. As for frequency of updates, in my
experience, it is updated 2 or more times each month - usually leaning
towards the more. The advanced features are fantastic - I agree.
> Best thing happening right now is the antivirus companies are ponying
> up money and buying spyware prevention companies and integrating this
> into their software.
Yes - but they are so far behind still. I've tried these all in one things
and at this point, my opinion would be "stick to what you have been doing
for years, this obviously is not working out for you." heh
> Now again it is risky to run another spyware prevention program as
> conflicts can arise. Plus another double whammy is that you have to
> be careful what kind of spyware you delete off your system as
> legitimate software like Real Player and Ipod install spyware on your
> system. If you do peer-to-peer file sharing then they want to know
> about it. They want you to purchase their song tracks and not get
> them for gratis. Another problem is just a plain tracking cookie can
> be considered spyware when you talk about companies like atdmt. Go
> ahead and look up how much information they collect on people.
> [everything under the sun] One other dilemna with tracking cookies is
> if you don't let them in to your system then you are not going to be
> able to either completely see the website or you won't get on the
> website and you will just get a blank page.
Oh - I would not recommend turning off cookies. They are too widely used.
This is a point where common sense comes into play. However, I have never
seen a cookie that NEEDED to stick around longer than it's instantaneous
use. I mean REALLY needed to stay - given that you know your information
for particular sites, etc.
Most people using P2P should already know the danger they could be putting
themselves in, and it it is a P2P applications that HAS to have spyware to
run, it's time to consider a different client software, IMHO. RealPlayer -
ick. I recommend ditching that as soon as anyone can. They have gotten too
commercialized IMO - and want too much (not talking money here, just
everything that the software wants its hands in.) RealAlternative is
working out great for me - even in a corporate environment with many
different people. As for the iPod software - you have seen something go
wrong with antispyware and iPod software? I have several customers and
friends that use a majority of the software I listed and have iPods on their
PCs and I have not yet seen any issues (although I would be interested in
hearing your experiences to prevent anything from occurring in the future.)
> Now a form of malware is legitimate software because it does not want
> to get itself out of your registry once you uninstall it because they
> are apprehensive about you
> violating user licenses. Another problem is when it uninstalls some
> of the files are still hiding all over your system. You have to do a
> survey of every path it uses when it installs itself. Unfortunately
> when you go to install related software it will not install properly
> because of the mess the old software made out of your registry.
> Now that is malware city when you think about it and there are many
> applications that are guilty of this. Look before you install
> anything as Johnf made an excellent point about.
When you uninstall, I recommend always doing a CUSTOM uninstall whenever
possible and selecting everything on each screen. I have seen this alone
clean up the things you speak of, and I agree - there are still many
programs that leave behind garbage that perhaps you should manually clean -
if they are harmful.
> Free programs are not free most of the time as they install spyware ,
> adware or even malware on your system. Most of the programs you
> listed you have to be careful with unfortunately. Registry conflicts
> are a big problem with a lot of people's computer systems and
> networks. Well so is there good spyware or not that is the big
> question? Too many legitimate applications want to push themselves
> into prominence onto your system and want to be the chief
> application. Do you want it to be Windows Media Player , Real Player
> . or Apple Computers IPod companion?
I have yet to find a "good" spyware/malware or had ill-effects from
removing/immunizing with any of the programs I listed. If it was just my
machine - I wouldn't make that claim, but after doing it on thousands of
machines with many different applications installed and with many different
users with extraordinarily different habits - I feel pretty confident in
saying it. Yes - I suppose it could happen. It might keep their P2P
application from working or something - but if they did not know that their
P2P application had malware in it - that is something they SHOULD know.
Look for the alternatives. As for registry conflicts - again - I have not
witnessed this issue running the antimalware applications. It more than
likely happens. Can you tell me in more specifics what you have seen? The
more information out there, the easier it is to avoid such a thing in the
future.
> Another dangerous thing is downloading those so called free spyware
> scanners as once most get on your system they don't leave after
> uninstall.
>
> udent for you to go into the registry and just do a search of a
> program you just unintalled and see if they had enough integrity to
> clear out all the registry entries and they just have no default set
> which is great if you just see that. But if you go in and you see the
> entire right side filled with entries you have problems.
Why do you "have problems"? If those entries are idle, you have wasted
database space. You can leave them or delete them without ill-effect and
little if any noticable performance gain. They SHOULD clean themselves up,
but you want to go someplace like:
http://www.spywarewarrior.com/rogue_anti-spyware.htm
Before installing an "antispyware" application, to be sure they are on the
up-n-up.
I do not think any novice should go around their registry and delete things
without doing some research first - and if they are not going to read a
simple computer maintenance document like the one I present to them (and
they don't already know most of it), then I think them messing with their
registry in any form may be asking for trouble.
> Hence the best way for you to get rid of that annoying site is too
> clear out your history entirely. Purge your entire run command also
> and clear out all your caches that are present. One other way is to
> look into getting another browser that protects against that kind of
> thing.
Which is, indead, one of the suggestions in the "spiel". Clear out the TIF
and shrink the size it can take up. Check your startups and make sure you
know everything that is there and WHY it is there. You are welcome to use
an alternative browser, but don't think "now that I am using "browserX", I
can surf where I want, click where I want and nothing bad will happen to
me."
> Please Internet Explorer update and add more features!!!
I have to applaud the features added with SP2, it is a definite move in the
right direction. Still a ways to go - but at least there was movement on
this last turn.
Thanks for the comments!
- Next message: Wesley Vogel: "Re: Reboot error"
- Previous message: Will Denny: "Re: page file - virtual memory problem"
- In reply to: Alan: "Re: How do I get rid of this annoying site"
- Next in thread: Alan: "Re: How do I get rid of this annoying site?"
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