Slashdot Mirror
The Average PC is Infested with Spyware
WoodenRobot writes "This article claims that Earthlink have discovered that the average user's PC has 28 spyware programs on it. More details can be found on Earthlink's spyware auditing page." Compare to a university study. The FTC is hosting a Spyware Workshop.
While most spyware is adware-related and relatively benign, it's disturbing that over 300,000 of the more serious system monitors and Trojans were uncovered
I don't think most adware is benign since it eats into available RAM. Some adware also affects application performance, or, worse yet, prevents applications from running. Anyway, I am, again, preaching to the choir.....
Happy Trails!
Erick
http://www.busyweather.com/
Ask anybody who services PCs...there's not a machine around that isn't riddled with the stuff, but making a headline out of it is like shrieking about the existence of viruses.
Ditch IE for Firefox. I just did 2 clients' computers today (running slow, yadayada) and guess what? One had 18 spyware trojans installed, the other had 64 (as well as a couple of viruses). Firefox (any Gecko-based browser) is not vulnerable to the crap that IE is. I always tell my clients to not use IE anymore. When they listen, they always have a better overall experience.
bash: rtfm: command not found
I'm not sure if you're serious, but you are claiming that Earthlink's spyware removal tool includes spyware? I find this quite hard to believe, if only because that's not their business model, and for a major ISP, customer trust is worth more than spyware revenues. Care to provide links to back up this accusation?
Note that of those 30 pieces of spyware per PC, 24 of them are labeled as "cookies."
That's not "slightly" misleading, that is *extremely* misleading. The BBC article makes no mention of "cookie". They do say "average of 28 spyware programs", but isn't a Cookie generally more benign then a "program"? A program is usually active; a cookie sits there.
By the way, the BBC sets a Cookie on your system. Perhaps we should sue?
"Can of worms? The can is open... the worms are everywhere."
Almost right, but better phrasing would be 'the average computer user is ignorant'. They're not stupid, they just don't know how it works.
This is, in my mind, actually worse - you can't help being dumb but you can help not knowing what the hell you're doing. If I bought a car I would make a point of knowing roughly how it worked, how I should maintain it and how to fix basic faults when it goes wrong. I am not a mechanic but it seems to me common sense to understand how somthing I use often works. I would think that non-techies would have this attitude about computers (which they don't neccesarily care about but need every day) just as I have the attitude about cars (which I don't really care about but would use daily).
Isn't this illegal on several levels? How are these companies not being sued left and right? I can't believe this has become an acceptible standard.
Better still to say "the average Slashdot editor is an idiot". If you had seen the Arstechnica coverage this would be apparent - what we're looking at here is a tabloid-tyle headline as a cheesy attention-getter. I see the same mind-numbing stupidity whenever I check hotmail!
The "Spyware" reported consists of cookies. Not trojans, backdoors, browser redirectors etc - cookies. Cookies can track you but they don't exercise code, and the ones that this software reports are not even fully researched. They're "potential" spyware - which is the same as finding a kid with three marijuana seedlings and charging him with posession of "potential" street value of $3 million.
Why would Earthlink do that? The Arstechnica article suggests it is because Earthlink advertise their Spyware-blocking service right next to the page that shows you the incredible amounts of spyware found on your system! Hmmm....
I don't know why I bother with slashdot. It must be a reflex built into my fingers or something but it certainly has turned to shit.
Now mod me down, editors. Show us how you censor those who disagree.
Most people don't think they have the time to become less ignorant, this stuff looks (and is) very complicated, and they don't know how they'd even go about it. It's really easy to overlook just how much more you know than the average person does, and it's easy to forget how much time it took you to accumulate this knowledge.
Another similar program is StartupCPL. Small (it's only an 80k binary), simple, works with pretty much every version of Windows out there (95, NT, 98, 98SE, 2000, ME, XP), free-as-in-beer (though go ahead and send the author a couple bucks).
It doesn't handle services, but it covers most everything else, except maybe autoexec.bat. And it's a lot faster than digging through the registry.
Thank god my parents have a Mac. I'm reading these horror stories and I am cringing thinking if I had to support a PC for the P's... I do support one for a friend, and my god what a clusterf**k. The're going to Mozilla for good.
I would mod you down if I had the points, not because you disagree, but because you are a dick about it. If the information is wrong, you should be pointing the finger at BBC news, which the headline here is entirely consistant with. Yes, the Arstechnica article has a good point that the article is perhaps wrong, but that is hardly the fault of the slashdot editor. I nice "well, arstechnica has evidence that casts doubt on the validity of this article" would have served the purpose just as well, and you would not looked like an ass doing it. And posting a link would have been nice too like Link would have been nice too.
And the same thing would probably be true if people took the same attitude toward keeping their computer running that they do toward keeping their car running. People accept that cars are complicated and require routine service. They understand that if they're not competent to do the service themselves that it makes sense to pay a professional to do it for them. They're willing to plunk down some serious coin to get the thing fixed if/when it breaks.
The problem is that many, if not most, people don't take the same attitude toward computers. They're encouraged to believe that computers are so easy to use that anyone can use and maintain one with little or no training. When problems do come up, they tend to try to solve them by asking a friend who is supposed to know this stuff what to do rather than spending money on a professional. Combine that attitude with deliberate attacks against computers by things like worms and spyware, and it should be no surprise that the average car is much better maintained than the average computer.
There's no point in questioning authority if you aren't going to listen to the answers.
The only reason I know how to care for my car is because it cost $15,000. The car I drove in college cost was a 15 year old POS I got for a couple hundred bucks so I could get groceries once a week, and I never changed the oil once. I drove on bald, half flat tires for a long time (I never went on the freeway, or over 45, so I didn't really care), and I let the radiator fluid (tap water) get really low on several occasions because of a slow leak.
I didn't care. That car did what I needed it to do for as long as I needed to do it before I could afford a better one. In other words, it was exactly like a computer to most people.
It's nothing but crumpled porno and Ayn Rand.
I'm certain that Linux isn't 100% safe, but I reckon it's a lot safer than Windows for the following reasons.
There are other reasons that will only hold true until Linux becomes more popular. So these are good reasons for now, but won't hold true forever.
Yes, they do. They know that if smoke starts coming out from somewhere else than the exhaust pipe, they'd better stop and get out of the car, fast. They know that if lights start flashing in the dashboard with no apparent reason the car needs to be serviced. They know that they must not pour water into the gasoline tank, and that if the tires are flat they need to be reinflated, and so on. They also know that it's a good idea to lock the doors when you leave the car.
On the other hand, people don't know that you shouldn't open strange e-mail attachments, that you should run a firewall, and that you should install updates at least weekly (which is not difficult - both Linux and Windows come with automatic tools that search, download and install the neccessary updates at your command).
So basically, people do know what to expect from a car, and can reognize when something is wrong with it. On the other hand, people do not know what to expect from a computer, and when something is wrong with it (and thus can't have it fixed).
Computers are not like other tools, nor will they ever be. People expect to use them without understanding any of the concepts and theory behind them, and then get angry and frustrated when they can't make the computer understand what they want. It is absurd.
Personally, I think every computer should ship with a 200-page book explaining the basic concepts and theory behind the computers. And I mean basic theory, not "install a new printer this way". All support should be denied before this book has been both read and understood.
Anyone who is incapable of understanding how computers work shouldn't be using them without supervision, for his sake and everyone else's. Harsh, but the only solution sort of running a truly sentient AI in every computer.
Forget magic. Any technology distinguishable from divine power is insufficiently advanced.