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Does Spyware Damage Windows Networking?

Posted by Cliff on from the removing-the-stealth-riders dept.

DerBryGuy asks: "I work for an ISP in Canada. Recently we have had a rash of customers whose computers can connect via DSL, but cannot browse, or often even ping. Invariably it turns out that there is some spy ware of some sort installed on the customers machine - usually New dot Net or the other drek that comes with Kazaa. About half the time if this is removed correctly (manually or by using ad-aware) then the machine will regain http access. However the other half of the time the only option we have found is to format and reinstall the OS. So I am wondering, are other ISP's seeing this? What do they do when they get a similar complaint and they detect spyware on the machine. Is there any recourse for the customer? I mean most of these people had no idea what New dot Net was when their kid installed Kazaa, and now they are stuck with a computer store bill for reinstalling their machine."

3 of 52 comments (clear)

  1. New versions of antivirus software by Halvard · · Score: 3, Informative


    We seen this but not with spyware. Customer calls saying they no longer can access the internet. Invariably, they have updated their antivirus software and it now includes a personal firewall. Said firewall doesn't allow ports 80, 25, or 110. We've seen this with McAfee and with a less well know brand the name of which escapes my memory at the moment.


    We have seen spyware cripple the performance of a machine though.

  2. Re:Apparently you're not the only one by Cpyder · · Score: 3, Informative

    If you really want KaZaA, but without the spyware, you should checkout KaZaA lite (kazaalite.com). Be sure not to allow KaZaA to update itself (like now with the 1.7 version), as it will install the Sharman Networks version with said spyware. A nice p2p-program without spyware is WinMX, too bad there are no Linux clients for it. (for their own network, that is.. Opennap clients enough.)

  3. Send out an email by gmhowell · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I'm sure that using that crap is against the TOS. Send out a bulk email to all customers saying that there is a grace period of 30 days where you will help them through uninstalling Kazaa and all that rubbish. After that, it will be either a $100 per incident fee to do it, or you will be on your own.

    Yeah, probably wouldn't work unless you were AOL or someone like that. Being a small ISP must really suck at times.

    --
    Jesus was all right but his disciples were thick and ordinary. -John Lennon