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This guy sounded way more interesting, yet how many people heard about it? There are several news articles remaining on the web about him. I once dug far enough to find something about him needing to build something higher up than he was at the time, and more involving aliens and the military.

Google his name and search for yourself. Was it really a mental disorder or something more?

Dead founder of Webroot, Steven Thomas, more interesting
------------------------

Search Continues For Missing Millionaire

http://www.thedenverchannel.com/news/search-continues-for-missing-millionaire

"The last time I saw him on Thursday, he was having major panic attacks. He was very agitated, aggressive. He was very paranoid. He thinks everyone on the island is out to get him," said his wife, Candis Thomas. "He thinks the military is involved, he thinks that aliens are involved, and he's just been in a real delusion state of being fearful."

"He said he needed to use the bathroom, but never returned. At the time he was wearing a light-green T-shirt, shorts and slippers."

##

Missing Webroot founder found dead
Tragic end in Hawaii

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/07/14/webroot_founder_dead/

"Police have recovered the body of missing technology entrepreneur Steven Thomas, the founder of anti-spyware firm Webroot Software[1]."

"Thomas was reportedly suffering from paranoid delusions running up to the time of his disappearance."

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Webroot
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steven_Thomas_(entrepreneur)

"he did send a letter to his closest friends that if he turned up missing or dead it was not his fault."

##

http://www.lavasoft.com/mylavasoft/company/blog/in-our-thoughts

##

Millionaireâ(TM)s falling death âis beyond sadâ(TM)

http://archives.starbulletin.com/2008/07/15/news/story03.html

"Hikers found the badly decomposed body of the Lanikai resident, who was reported to have a bipolar disorder, at 12:45 p.m. Sunday below the Pali Lookout, nearly two weeks after his disappearance."

"Police have not yet ruled out foul play, Maj. Alan Bluemke said yesterday, although he emphasized no foul play was suspected. The case remains classified as an unattended death, pending the full medical examiner's report.

According to his wife, Thomas began developing problems in April, had been arrested for running naked in his neighborhood and was diagnosed later with bipolar disorder, also called manic-depressive illness, but had refused medication.

Police had described Thomas as emotionally distraught, and his wife had said he had been displaying suicidal behavior.

Thomas had been involved in real estate and stocks after selling Webroot Software, known for its Spy Sweeper software, in 2004 for $108 million."

##

Mysterious events surround death of former FOUNDER of the company WEBROOT â" GOOGLE about the former FOUNDER of the company WEBROOT, Steven Thomas.

Maybe he was onto something? You have to read many articles about him to get a better picture of how odd the events were surrounding his death. Webroot Software founder Steven Thomas was found dead in Hawaii. Save the articles and store them off-line on read only media because the stories will disappear eventually.

Many articles mention he said he was being harassed by ALIENS and THE GOVERNMENT, and others.

Sounds like MKULtra to me.

##

Webroot founder died from fall

Furthermore, look at the best-of-class spyware tools:
http://www.malwarebytes.org/mbam.php -- no OSX or Linux versions
http://fileforum.betanews.com/detail/Spybot-Search-Destroy/1043809773/1 -- no OSX or Linux versions
http://www.lavasoft.com/products/ad_aware_free.php?t=techspecs -- no OSX or Linux versions

Why could that be? Maybe because OSX and Linux don't allow malware to be installed, and the MicroIdiots have their heads up your ass.

Lavasoft has published a list of rouges that might be helpful when people see scareware. But, I guess, the only problem is make people look at this list before they buy security software
http://www.lavasoft.com/mylavasoft/rogues/latest

What finger am i holding up for that company.....

Ah, so that's what the Ad-Aware 11 logo looks like!

But seriously: How do you trust a "security" company whose own download links all lead to a dead blank page until you unblock JavaScript not only on their site (www.lavasoft.com) but on a third-party site you've never heard of (www.trialpay.com)?

I used to put Ad-Aware on every computer, but around version 7 Ad-Watch started dragging down my clients' computers, then started dragging down my computers. I still offer it occasionally to clients who are unusually malware-prone, but it got past the cure-is-worse-than-the-disease part for a lot of people a while back. Maybe this new buzzword-thing version will clear some of that up.

For a while I used BartPE with a copy of Avira anti-virus along with SpyBot Search and Destroy and Adaware. Haven't tried out the latest version of Adaware on Bart yet, been a while since I needed the disk.

BartPE - http://www.nu2.nu/pebuilder/
Avira - http://www.avira.com/en/pages/index.php
SpyBot Search and Destroy - http://www.spybot.org/en/index.html
Adaware - http://www.lavasoft.com/

Part of this may sound like preaching to the choir, but bear with me. There is a tendency to want the government to do something about every problem, and the hassle of online scumbaggery is no exception. Individuals (and their guardians) need to take responsibility for their own protection, and not expect either the government to protect them (which it cannot) or for faceless strangers to be kind to them, which a tiny but significant portion will not.

Each of these steps solves roughly half of the remaining problems not solved by the previous ones.

1. A fool and his unarchived data are soon parted. If you want it, make an offline copy of it.
2. Switch to Linux, a Mac, or Anything But Windows. Most of the following only apply if this one won't work for you.
3. Switch to Mozilla Firefox.
4. Buy and install a firewall box.
5. Buy and install a virus scanner.
6. Download and install Lavasoft Ad-Aware or similar spyware detector, even if your virus scanner says it provides that protection.
7. Don't open email with attachments, or respond to spam with so much as a single click. You have been warned.
8. Stay away from porn sites. They're bad for your computer.
9. Stay away from online games except those you know to be crap-free.
10. You don't know that any of them are crap-free.
11. Don't download commercial music except from commercial vendors to whom you pay a fee. Yeah, sucks to be us. But you get what you deserve, and if you're trying to get something for nothing, you'll give something for nothing in return.

So what do you do if your kids download some game, P2P app, or other crapware-laden piece of stupidity? Take away the computer. What if you have several kids, and you don't know who did it? Enlist their aid and hold them all accountable. Tell them that if any of them downloads crapware and the guilty party won't come forward, they all do their homework at the library (for a week or month or whatever).

This is true, in fact after 60 days if you perform a scan even the clean result window will have a big red cross on it!

Uninstall and put Antivir (http://www.avira.com/en/pages/index.php) (you can change the update reminders in preferences) and Zonealarm (http://www.zonelabs.com/) on instead, for FREE!

You can also use AdAware (http://www.lavasoft.com/products/ad-aware_se_pers onal.php) and Spybot Search and destroy (http://www.safer-networking.org/en/download/index .html), to clean up spyware.

PS: DONT USE INTERNET EXPLORER (dont know about v7 though?) use firefox instead http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/

I wonder how effective ordinary antivirus programs or spyware removal programs are on Zombie computers? Ad-Aware is one example of a spyware removal program for Windows. To help avoid problems in the first place, I have always used a properly configured firewall either on the computer or router (or both) to block access to TCP/IP ports. I occasionally check my firewall by going to grc.com and having the Shields Up test done. After going to their web page I click on ShieldsUP!, then "Proceed," then "Continue," then "All Service Ports."

On both the Windnows and Linux computers I also use the latest version of Mike's Ad Blocking Hosts file to block many of the known advertising related URLs. I don't know to what extent that might or might not possibly be helpful in preventing problems. It is mainly intended to block certain kinds of ads.

I also regularly download the latest security updates for both the Windows and Linux computers. Most people only do spyware and antivirus checking their Windows computers, not their Linux boxes. There are actually a few anti-virus programs for Linux but there aren't yet any Linux viruses successfully circulating in the wild. At home, I only send and receive email from my Linux box, because it is probably safer. I also use the Linux box for the majority of my web browsing. I do use the netstat command once in a while to see what TCP/IP communication is going on. But anyway, I am not a computer professional, those are just a few thoughts from a paranoid home computer user. I haven't yet learned how to do some other security measures such as reading security log files or detecting rootkits. I also haven't yet got around to learning to use the netstat command under linux or packet sniffers.

http://www.sysinternals.com/Utilities/RootkitRevea ler.html has a tool that can help flesh out all those registry and file system API discrepancies for further study.

Of course it's always safe to run AdAware[ http://www.lavasoft.com/ ] and if you have the budget, purchase WebRoot[ http://www.webroot.com/ ] for a fast, centralized cleaning in the enterprize environment.

Probably what happened was something related to this. I remember that Ad-Aware slowed down their releases a lot while the transition was going on.

In any case, what bothered me was not the innacuracy of your comment, but the fact that you were trying to discredit the poster for no good reason. I don't even like Ad-Aware that much!

I run XP with IE and I'm not having browswer crash. Maybe you should clean out all the spyware and other crap first.

A firewall doesn't protect everything. A firewall with a clueless user at the helm won't protect you from quite a lot. It won't protect you from buffer overflows, system exploits, or a lot of other automated exploits. It won't protect you from a lot of spoof attacks. It will make you non-pingable, which helps, but anything you have enabled might still be a way in. Saying that having the built-in XP firewall running gives you a 100% chance of not being compromised is like saying that having antilock breaks gives you 100% chance of surviving a crash. It helps, but if it's your only line of defense, you're screwed. Quite frankly it's grossly inappropriate to tell people to not worry anymore. Everyone should pick up a free firewall (of the kind that can detect outgoing traffic, as opposed to SP2), a free AV software package, and a free spyware detector or two.

We just had a bug fly around my work, owning the network. This was with a hardware firewall and AV. Both were working, it was just a bug that was too new and the AV vendor hadn't discovered it yet.

I've got one Windows machine, running 2K Pro, and hiding somewhere on it is ISTsvc.exe. Pesky little bugger. Can't seem to get rid of it, but I can keep it contained with:
AdAware
Spybot Search and Destroy
SpywareBlaster
and
F-Prot Antivirus, which actually does a good job all by itself.
I tried the Symantec Istbar removal tool, but to no avail. I might try digging around in the registry again, but last time I did that it didn't work either.

Any suggestions, anyone?

(tig)

You could also take a look at your hosts file - If your run windows it is %systemroot%\system32\drivers\etc\hosts or on a *nix based OS it is /etc/hosts. The hosts file bypasses normal DNS queries and is sometimes used by spyware/adware to hijack your connections. Try using a product like adaware or another spyware removal tool if you are running windows.

First, as a teacher and now homeschool mom who attempted to use Linux for over a year I must say that the comment on moving to Linux was uncalled for. I loved it for its stability, but had to give it up due to the lack of quality (appealing and intuitive interface, non-crashing, easy to install, and actually educational in nature) educational games and resources. Good design is especially important when dealing with children, espcially those with special needs (read special ed students), and with adults who need occuptaional/recreational therapy. There is, or was last year, a significant lack of quality educational games that are stable

Aside from that, there are plenty of good games out there, especially ones which are educational (which would prove especially helpful in dealing with stroke as they would help rebuild the pathways and make new ones.)

There are many good educational sites that are free to use and that are very simple to get to, especially if you were to make her homepage a custom designed web portal with links to all the sites and activities you think she will enjoy. I did this for my kids, designing a site for each that has picture links to all their favorite web sites.

Depending on the level and area of damage you should be able to make a portal of links that would suit her needs. If you need a jumping off point with a variety of educational sites you could look through the links on our site: http://www.shamusyoung.com/kidsportal/kidshome.htm l. Feel free to copy and use the source if you like. I would look through the different sites and see what is most likely to work on the areas she needs, i.e. Memory (the game), math games, logic games, etc.

http://www.popcap.com/ games, Real.com, Shockwave, and Yahoo also have some great games that help build problem solving skills, working with the logic/mathmatical part of the brain, even Tetris is good for logic developement. (if you don't mind the occasional spyware, in fact installing http://www.lavasoft.com/ Ad-aware and an anti-virus program like http://www.grisoft.com/doc/1 AVG would be wise prior to any downloads).

If you can get a hold of the old "Doctor Brain" games they are wonderful for this type of situation as they are fun to play (even for adults) and deliberately work on different parts of the brain, i.e. File Sorting to work with memory, etc. The Incredible Machine games and Lemmings are also good for logic and problem solving developement.

Hello,

I too have been running the beta test version of Microsoft Antispyware too and when I looked on my PC and found the ERRORS.LOG and CLEANERS.LOG in the installation directory. They were 8KB and 2KB, respectively. To contrast, Spybot - Search & Destroy had 188KB of logs in its \LOGS directory and Ad-aware had 1.4MB (although these seemed mostly to be related to installation), so perhaps it is an issue with your computer's configuration? Either that, or perhaps it found malicious software and removed it--something my installation did not.

The program is still in beta, so support isn't available through normal Microsoft channels, here is the link to the support newsgroup.

Regards,

Aryeh Goretsky

Basically now, I install AntiVir http://www.free-av.com/ and Adaware http://www.lavasoft.com/ , and together they can do a pretty great job of cleaning the computer. Toss on Firefox and say "Use this, not IE" and they have been in pretty good shape!

In any case, lots of people here have the skill to help them out, share it! I'm sure most already do!

I'm starting to ask people for permission to set up their boxes to dual-boot to Linux. Linux is so usable now that, unless there's a specific application that they can't get an equivalent on Linux. I really don't see much need for most home users to stay with MS Windows.

At least that's how I see it. And I'm not even a file trader.

Consider: The industry has been utterly unable to stop P2P to date, and a whacked-out move like this will probably be countered in a matter of days as the authors of SpyBot and AdAware catch on and release updated signature files.

Why go to the trouble of doing something that at least some in the industry know will be easily counteracted unless they're so flustered that they're not thinking straight?

The other indicator that makes me think this is sheer desperation are the comments from Marc Morgenstern. "Just deserts?" Criminys... He sounds like a grumpy kid who got his favorite marbles taken away or something.

Remember that at least one legislator, under pressure from the RIAA, once floated the idea of hiring system crackers to do their level best to try to sabotage P2P networks. The idea withered at the time, mainly because it would have run afoul of the federal Computer Fraud and Abuse Act.

However, it is evident that the RIAA was not so easily dissuaded. They've found a sneaky way to deliver what they, in their deluded way, think is going to be a knockout punch. Adware and spyware are not (yet) illegal that I know of. What better loophole to try and pull the stunts the industry's been wanting to pull all along?

How's it all going to end? Well, this kind of move will make all the file sharers and sharing networks even more mad at the industry than they were before (assuming that's possible). It will serve as yet another wedge driven between an industry that is clearly too greedy to see past the end of its collective noses, and God knows how many people who might have been customers under different conditions.

The biggest irony to me is that they STILL haven't gotten it through their thick skulls that their music sales are down mainly because they're putting out slop that no one really wants to buy.

Example: I used to buy at least a dozen CD's a month in the early-to-mid 90's. However, in the last six years, I've bought maybe half a dozen. If that. I'm just not hearing the raw talent that I used to.

Seems to me that the industry is a victim of their own delusions. I think a line from Adam Savage, found in the opening credits for Mythbusters, hits the issue spot on: "I reject your reality, and substitute my own!"

I predict an entertainment industry implosion, due primarily to pissed-off customers and a consequent reduction in sales, within the next decade.

Keep the peace(es).

One of the unfortunate side effects of competition is that even competition among vermin makes them more potent vermin. Now spyware authors will be shoring up their spyware defenses to ensure they are the only leech attached to the host. New, probably more sinister techniques will be developed to both protect one spyware installation as well as prevent/deactivate others. They may even take an offensive strategy to defending themselves. All this will make it even more difficult for the average user to both rid their machine of existing spyware as well as prevent the introduction of new spyware.

Let's hope the folks at Lavasoft (makers of Ad-aware) and others are ready for the almost certain onslaught of new techniques.

antivir seems to work ok,
and is updated afaik.
Spyware removal software is obligatory on windwos as well.

• CygWin. The Linux-like environment for Windows.
  Mozilla. Use this for mail, news, and browsing if you like.
  Firebird. for FAST browsing.
  WS FTP Light. A FREE, FTP client that works great.
  Filezilla. which is TRULY free and does sftp as well.
  PuTTY. a free SSH client for Windows.
  TTSSH. is a much less clunky ssh client than PuTTY.
  iXplorer. freeware secure FTP client
  VNC hello!? remote controll software.
  Tight VNClike the original, only FAST.
  GNU-EMacs for Windows. just trust me ;).
  Dev-C++a free C++ compiler for those who can't afford VS.
  NetHack. as someone here said, you MUST have NetHack installed on everything...
  Free-AV.free Anti-Virus software for Windows, (mandatory these days). or
  AVG Free edition. another free Anti-Virus software for Windows.
  Zonealarm. my favorite Personal Firewall,, really!. or
  Kerio. another firewall that some seem to like. or
  Sygate. yet another firewall. whatever floats your boat.
  Boingo. to see where the closest hotspot is, hehe.
  OpenOffice 1.1 the Microsoft Office KILLER :) {really!}
  Winamp 2.x for audio/video usage in Windows, stay away from the new one :).
  Mark's Adding Machine is much better than the Windows calculator.
  SpyBot Search & Destroy The best Ad-ware / Spyware removal tool we've found, "IE is unusable without".
  Ad-Aware another spy-ware app "alas poor Windoze."
  Trillian a favorite IM, since we're all chatters @ heart. or
  GAIM since trillian hogs resources, "bad piggy!".
  Gimp image creation/editing. Who needs Photoshop anyway?
  EnZip freeware Zip Utility, Stop nagging you WinZip!!
  Iview is a great little image viewer. or
  Irfanviewone of the best image viewer out there for Windows.
  Audacity is a great little sound editor.
  Virtual Dub. a great video editor.
  cDex gotta rip those cd's for the RIAA!
  MAME for games, period. Free. You can buy some ROMs, or *ahem* ask around. and finally
  XPantiSPY since XP is E-V-I-L.

And FINALLY, don't trust me! Trust the experts;

Go to the Pricelessware site maintained by the alt.comp.freeware Usenet group.
The

The best Ad-ware / Spyware removal tool I've found is
SpyBot Search & Destroy

There is also Ad-Aware though.

Other stuff (non spyware related):
Winamp(2x is best)
Trillian/Gaim
Browsers (and mail): IE6, Mozilla, Opera are all fine

I've found both SlickRun and PopupPopper from Bayden Software to be useful as well.

This is a problem that needs to be addressed. I sent this question to Lawarence Lessig when /. did the interview, of course there were better questions to anwser. My whole argument started with pop-up ads. By going to a website, you are agreeing to that sites terms of use. The sites are using advertising as revenue to provide the service that we as a user request. Now enter pop-up stopper software. Is it legal for you to effectively block there only source income that most of these sites have? So then we get into the this issue, "Well, I didn't give that site permission to use my RAM, my CPU, and my HD space." Also, the same arguement applies for the installed ad-tracking software. I didn't tell them that I wanted that salsa. So, there is a shareware program called AdAware(made by Lavasoft, great piece of software. It goes through the Windows Registry and finds a bunch of these little programs. Double-Click is by far the worst at doing this, last time I ran the program, I had 69 little programs tracking my use of the net. This raises this question, Should I as a consumer have to pay for software that blocks companies from abusing my rights? I've been pondering these questions for a few months, and still haven't found resolve.