Sneak Peek At Microsoft Anti-Spyware

Ant writes "Broadband Reports mentions Neowin's sneak peek of Microsoft's upcoming anti-spyware software recently acquired community favorite Giant spyware; Microsoft has code-named their re-hashed version of that software 'Atlanta.' It is currently in an internal beta test. There are screenshots of the application in action."

Comments

Sample

[Anonymous Coward]

Warning: Firefox detected! - Internet Hijacker - Automatically deleted for your protection.

Re:Sample

[BottleCup]

Think this funny all you want, but the parent post may have a point there. Perhaps this is another devious way MS is going to try to get ahead of rival products - i.e. by labelling them as Spyware. Some windows users are just silly enough to believe anything MS says.

Re:Sample

[Nik13]

Actually, one of the things I noticed about this Giant-Antispyware is the number of false positives. On some systems it found a half dozen of them (things like VNC and such). Also the slowest, high memory usage, and last I tried, cancelling a scan doesn't let you delete what was found on the partial scan.

Most likely they'll charge for this product, whereas it's completely unnecessary if you use firefox and IE and don't install apps like Gator and such.

Re:Sample

[Zemran]

Maybe they will simply fix IE so that it does not accept so much rubbish onto the PC and it will appear like this 'new' product is great.

To me it seems like getting a broom to crack a nut. If you use the right tool (read Firefox) in the first place you do not need to sweep up the mess.

Re:Sample

[Anonymous Coward]

Is that you, Steve?

Re:Sample

[macdaddy357]

Microsoft wasted their money. Pest Patrol, the only one worth paying for, already got gobbled up by Computer Associates. I hope CA doesn't screw it up.

Re:Sample

[Michael Hunt]

One would hope that if somebody actually took the initiative in installing Firefox, or similar, that they would know that the MS tool is, in fact, lying.

That said, dollars to donuts that nobody who'd install FF or its ilk would pay Microsoft for something they can get for free off Lavasoft/Spybot.

Re:Sample

[LO0G]

They already did that with IE - it's call XP SP2.

With XP SP2, modulo security holes, the defaults on downloading code are all NO - the user has to decide that they want the rubbish or not.

After that, it's a question of user education.

Re:Sample

[has2k1]

That is true to a big extent. Afew months ago I was helping a couple of university students with spyware and viruses and one thing suprised me on some machine.

This girl had acquired a pirated version of Norton 2004 off kazaa or some p2p and I think it was bundled with a crack. To cut the story short, Norton virus scan was detecting the crack file(Norton2004crack.exe) as a viral file. She thought the whole program was a virus since it was detecting "itself" as a virus.

Ofcourse I made a couple of bucks troubleshooting this.

Re:Sample

[__aatgod8309]

Fixing IE would involve such a substantial change to both itself and windows that it won't happen. You've seen how long it took to provide the 'fixes' in SP2 for XP, and in the end it diverted staff from development of Longhorn. Imagine that applied to something even more fundamental to windows, like redesigning ActiveX to be easier to manage, or making IE an optional windows component.

That kind of work would be probably be even harder than writing Longhorn, and we've seen how long that's taking. And that would most likely require a development team as big as that of Longhorn, if not bigger. And they wouldn't be getting paid for it - so what do you thing the chances are of MS doing that?

Re:Sample

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, NAV2004 added a couple new "anti-virus" categories for "hacker tools" like keygens.

Re:Sample

[chiseen]

It tried to delete parts of shareaza. And yes, its very slow, it takes 2 seconds for a button to respond.

Re:Sample

[NPN_Transistor]

Some people may think Firefox has a virus in it... that happened once when I installed Firefox for someone and for a while they thought it was a virus before they found out that their computer's problems were actually caused by a real virus. If Microsoft lists competing products as spyware, I think a lot of people would think... "What??? I didn't know that was spyware. Oh well, better safe then sorry, better delete it". Unfortunately, people are very easily fooled in this world. Talking about fooled, the spyware program doesn't seem to be a very effective one. They just want to make people think that Windows is secure. E.G. Even though XP includes a firewall, it isn't all that effective, and that's why a lot of people still buy seperate firewalls.I think the same thing will happen with these so-called "anti-spyware tools".

Re:Sample

[d34thm0nk3y]

Perhaps this is another devious way MS is going to try to get ahead of rival products - i.e. by labelling them as Spyware.

uhhh...yeah...maybe if they just canned the entire legal department....

Re:Sample

[Tough Love]

Actually, one of the things I noticed about this Giant-Antispyware is the number of false positives. On some systems it found a half dozen of them (things like VNC and such). Also the slowest, high memory usage, and last I tried, cancelling a scan doesn't let you delete what was found on the partial scan.

This is going to be comical. Microsoft users will spend all their time scanning for spyware from now on. The false positives should be especially entertaining in terms of Microsoft users learning to hate Microsoft more than they already do. And some spyware is still going to get through. No, let me correct that, tons of spyware is going to get through because it's just so profitable for the spammers to find ways of getting it through.

Microsoft is its own worst enemy.

Re:Sample

[mrjb]

Problem is getting people to install and use it. My mother in law wouldn't use firefox in a hundred years because some of the websites of the suppliers of her company rely on broken javascript. Needless to say, she blames the browser. Mozilla isn't going to fix this-- because, as they say, it would add bloat and they'd be chasing a moving target. This makes sense, but in the meantime it stops people from switching over.

Re:Sample

[Plumbo]

On the http://www.microsoft.com/athome/security/spyware/ page they have a list on the top 3 things you can do to prevent spyware: Wonder why it didnt say "Install firefox!".

Re:Sample

[Errtu76]

That said, dollars to donuts that nobody who'd install FF or its ilk would pay Microsoft for something they can get for free off Lavasoft/Spybot.

They would, if the tool provided by Microsoft detected everything (and more) that the 2 programs combined detect.

Some say Ad-Aware is better than Spybot. Others claim vice-versa. Only yesterday i first ran Spybot (detected 19 objects correctly) and then Ad-Aware, which still detected 39 objects (that Spybot somehow missed). Other people may tell you the same story, only with Ad-Aware running prior to Spybot.

Fact is now that you need _several_ programs to remove spyware from a computer (CWshredder anyone?), and i personally would like to have one program that does everything the seperate programs do. That the tool is provided by MS doesn't really matter (to me).

Re:Sample

[unapersson]

"because, as they say, it would add bloat and they'd be chasing a moving target."

That's rubbish. Mozilla implements the standards, all they need to do is follow the standards and Mozilla will support it. No moving target there.

Re:Sample

[AaronLawrence]

You misunderstand. *Mozilla* would be chasing the moving target of (nonstandard) IE Javascript.

Re:Sample

[Jedi Alec]

If Microsoft lists competing products as spyware, I think a lot of people would think... "What??? I didn't know that was spyware. Oh well, better safe then sorry, better delete it".

Considering their recent track record in the european courts...I almost wish they'd go ahead and try to get away with that one.

Re:Sample

[Tony-A]

This is going to be comical.

Reminds me of one of the fun things back in the days of boot sector viruses.
Do a virus scan of a floppy with a known boot virus.
If the virus scan detects the virus, you do not have the virus.
If the virus scan does not detect the virus, you know you do have the virus.

As for spyware (or viruses or other malware) getting through, consider that whoever is doing the stuff will surely have access to the latest anti-whatever and by stumbling around and blind luck will certainly be able to find a way to be undetected.

Re:Sample

[danheskett]

The moving target is emulating IE's handling of broken Javascript.


If Moz tried to implement this, they'd be climbing uphill.

Re:Sample

[hazem]

That's rubbish. Mozilla implements the standards, all they need to do is follow the standards and Mozilla will support it. No moving target there.

You don't seem to be getting it. Yes, Mozilla adheres to the standards, but there are lots of websites out there that don't. And they all don't necessarily break adherence in the same way.

The problem is not the website creators blaming Mozilla, it's the end user who can't get into the site they want. THEY blame Mozilla.

Mozilla is saying they won't try to implement fixes for the non-adherent websites because they are the moving target, and that adding the fixes adds bloat to the program.

The moving target is the non-adherent methods used by websites, not the standard that Mozilla follows.

Re:Sample

[Anonymous Coward]

How is IE a moving target at the moment? If IE stood still much more than it already is the apes will start to worship it as a monolith.

Re:Sample

[ctid]

Fact is now that you need _several_ programs to remove spyware from a computer[...]

I think this sums up the whole problem. It would appear that you need several programs to remove spyware from a computer which is running Microsoft Windows. I don't need several programs to remove spyware from my SUSE box at home. And I don't need several programs to remove spyware from my Apple laptop either. This problem is specific to Microsoft products - it's not related to computers per se.

Re:Sample

[rikkards]

Don't laugh. I have seen that with Norton where it would find a key generator and gripe about it being a bad file (can't remember exactly what it said but it wasn't a virus or trojan)

Re:Sample

[NardofDoom]

Agreed.

Which is exactly why I set my mother-in-law up with an eMac. I don't have the time to administer her computer, especially since she's the type that would download Bonzi Buddy because "it's cute." *shudder*

Re:Sample

[skiman1979]

I'm not sure you'll be able to have a single program that detects everything all the others do combined. Perhaps someone could develop a scanner that uses the database from Adaware and Spybot S&D and adds its own signatures into it. After that, Lavasoft may create new signatures that haven't yet been put into the newly developed program.

I run both Adaware and SpyBot S&D at work and at home (and have some relatives using them on a regular basis). Almost every time, one program gets done scanning, and then the other detects additional objects, no matter what order I run the scans in. I think it will always be this way.

You don't see this kind of activity on Linux or OS X, but then again, they do not have the same marketshare, and therefore not as many people developing malicious code for those platforms (some may argue this). Also, there seem to be a lot more "Joe User" people on Windows platforms who will blindly download the latest cute smiley program for their email or IM.

Re:Sample

[Anonymous Coward]

Fixing IE would involve such a substantial change to both itself and windows that it won't happen.

Well it doesn't change the fact that this is the wrong approach. Fixing IE means fixing a fundamental problem with windows. By adding this new anti-spyware layer, they are adding even more complexity and yeat another thing to break and cause trouble. Microsoft has so much money sitting around it's not even funny. They hire the best programmers on a regular basis. If MS doesn't have the "time" or is unwilling to make the effort then it's time to ask if it's worth using an OS where the parent company is basically to lazy to fix it.

Re:Sample

[Anonymous Coward]

And they wouldn't be getting paid for it

You know, I am getting tired of that argument!

The fact is, they have already been paid for it. They have been paid for it with total market domination in Web browsers. The fact that it doesn't continue to generate revenue for them is irrelevant. They made the choice to give it away with the OS to achieve that market dominance.

Now it is a product that, quite frankly, doesn't fscking work without unintended security problems! Even Microsoft admits that! Any drug manufacturer that distributed a product that did what it promised but had unfortunate side effects would be forced to remove it and/or sued into oblivion (Vioxx anyone?); any car manufacturer that delivered a product that worked but had safety issues would be forced to remove the product and/or be sued into oblivion (Corvair, anyone?); the list goes on and on. Why the hell is Microsoft untouchable?

Re:Sample

[Anonymous Coward]

Again, a Slashdot user speaking without thinking first; Dumbass, Giant software's spyware is by far much better than Ad-Aware and Spybot. Do your research, then make educated comments.

Re:Sample

[Anonymous Coward]

Has the legal department changed significantly since they had the little oopsie with false error messages, or maybe with implementing broken standards in Frontpage, or.. well you get the idea. If they can weasel out of being responsible with a plausible lie, and make money/market share doing it, they will. I'd guess that that applies to pretty much any political or business venture.

Re:Sample

[4of12]

Think this funny all you want, but the parent post may have a point there. Perhaps this is another devious way MS is going to try to get ahead of rival products - i.e. by labelling them as Spyware. Some windows users are just silly enough to believe anything MS says.

I suspect that scary warning pop-ups about "No trusted signature", where $TRUSTED_SIGNATURE are from public keys that MSDN hands out to people who pay and become a Certified Secure Partner or some such.

Anti-competitive, absolutely.

But, it can be quite effectively argued as being more secure than the current state of affairs (even open source projects use PGP signatures), while the general public and the politicians will never have enough patience to look at the devilish details of the issue.

Re:Sample

[Anonymous Coward]

How do you vote this past 5 on the funny scale? :-)

Re:Sample

[Nossie]

I think your right... this is money motivating Microsoft... nothing more..

IF Microsoft fixed their browser... they couldnt make money out their insecurities could they?

Re:Sample

[Anonymous Coward]

not only that, it immediately renders the file innocuous without asking, by default.

sucked when I opened a folder with a few old hard to find cracks and ping tools and suddenly norton zapped them all and warned me of "Hack.Tools". :/

Re:Sample

[Anonymous Coward]

To you, From, Steve

Re:Sample

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually, it's specific to any operating system that doesn't have a single digit marketshare, you dunce.

Re:Sample

[Anonymous Coward]

If you bother reading the results, you will see that the 'false positives' are nearly explained as such. Giant informs you that the programs could be used as spyware and lets you know they are isntalled on the system.

Re:Sample

[rmccann]

Friend of mine decieded to install Firefox on her fathers spyware infested Windows machine. he kept deleting it thinking it was adware.

Re:Sample

[dbacher]

People are not understanding the goal.

Wordpad is a basic word processor. Most of us would use OpenOffice or Word if there was any option, but every single Windows machine has WordPad.

Windows Firewall, likewise, is a basic firewall. It prevents most internet-based attacks, and it prevents servers from running on the computer without permission, but it doesn't stop much of anything else.

Windows anti-spyware will be similar. It will be a basic product that prevents most malicious software from getting a grip on the computer.

By the way, Spyware is easily preventable if you follow some of Microsoft's existing guidelines. The add a user wizard, for example, has since 2000 Pro defaulted to adding users to the "users" or "power users" group, not to the administrator group. This wizard, since 2000 pro, has denied users the rights to write HKEY_CLASSES and HKEY_SOFTWARE, as well as many individual subtrees, that these applications need to be able to run on startup, etc.

The Microsoft Installer automatically escalates to install, if it is correctly installed, or you must reboot to an administrative account.

This means ActiveX attacks in IE, for example, shouldn't be able to get a hold on a 2000 or XP system. Unfortunately, many systems are not configured correctly, and have lazy admins who don't take the time to properly lock them down.

Buffer overflows, etc. should likewise only impact the current session for the current user, and should give access to only the current user's data and files.

If you actually have the system configured this way, it means that Microsoft could add a hook to MS Installer for Giant to "work better," further encouraging a secure session.

MSI makes a transaction log, and "rolls back" if the install fails. It sees every file copied, where it is copied, etc. If there were a hook there (there currently is not) for a spyware scanner to connect, and if users correctly secured XP, this could potentially kill the ability to install unauthorized software.

If you combine this with application-level security, you would have a system where it was virtually impossible for an unauthorized application to run.

Zone Alarm Pro, for example, provides Application-level security on inbound and outbound internet connections. You can specify which applications are allowed to access which sites for which users, when they may be accessed, etc.

It is very difficult, once ZAP is installed, to have a program connect to a website without your knowledge of where it is trying to connect, the application name, etc. You see what the application is doing, and then you decide if you want it done or not.

Is it a perfect solution? No. But is it better than a buffer overrun in an e-mail program allowing a malformed RFC 822 (SMTP) message to execute arbitrary code and access every file the currently logged in user has access to?

And you can say protect from buffer overflows, they are shoddy programming, etc. but humans make mistake, and many programming languages don't have compiler-level checked buffers, in many cases because they impact performance severely, and apps are graded, often times, by performance.

And programs are often built by using common libraries, which means if the common library contains a bug, it tends to impact multiple applications.

You can focus on user education, etc., but the fact of the matter is the average user is lucky to figure out how to open a can of Soda in under half an hour, and would lose a writing competition to a hamster with a pen tied to its paw.

Re:Sample

[StikyPad]

Fact is now that you need _several_ programs to remove spyware from a computer

Or just one: HiJackThis

Re:Sample

[Cromac]

Some windows users are just silly enough to believe anything MS says.

More like many Windows users believe anything their computer says regardless of who or what caused the popup message.

Re:Sample

[Pax00]

don't you know? they already do....

Re:Sample

[incognitus ignavus]

AdAware and Spybot just don't cut it any more. There are scores, (hundreds?) of threats that they don't find and/or can't remove. CounterSpy (a clone of Giant Antispyware that MS bought,) or SpySweeper are much better. Neither catches everything. (I do use FF BTW.)

Re:Sample

[nixdorf_]

If you bother reading the results, you will see that the 'false positives' are nearly explained as such. Giant informs you that the programs could be used as spyware and lets you know they are isntalled on the system.

You're assuming people READ what their computer is telling them. If they bothered to read the text, they most likely wouldn't HAVE spyware in the first place.

wow... good job at nothing

[ack154]

I don't know if I'm extremely disappointed or not surprised at all... I wouldn't so much call this a "re-hashed" version, as I would a "re-branded" one. I used Giant AntiSpyware before the acquisition and I can say that it looks EXACTLY the same as the Giant version - except where you used to see the Giant name, you now see Microsoft. Even the installer is the same. Just what exactly are they beta testing? I didn't expect them to have to really change much, but I guess I just expected them to change SOMETHING more than the name.

Re:wow... good job at nothing

[Anonymous Coward]

They didn't just change the name, I'm sure that somewhere in there is additional code that has a crippling security hole just waiting to be discovered and exploited.

Seriously, back when Microsoft first got their grubby mitts on Virtual PC, the first thing they did was release an updater for it. If that updater did anything at all other than just replace "Connectix" with "Microsoft" everywhere in the program, I couldn't tell you what it was to save my life.

Re:wow... good job at nothing

[Anonymous Coward]

Seriously, back when Microsoft first got their grubby mitts on Virtual PC, the first thing they did was release an updater for it. If that updater did anything at all other than just replace "Connectix" with "Microsoft" everywhere in the program, I couldn't tell you what it was to save my life.

FUD. They also removed all the *nix variants from the "Create a new virtual machine" list. =)

Re:wow... good job at nothing

[superpulpsicle]

No need to get disappointed. That's the concept of OEM. They always just slap a new label on it. Do you think Dell does anything beside slapping their name on the product!? M$ would be stupid to fiddle with any code.

Re:wow... good job at nothing

[adeydas]

I guess they are testing whether it breaks down at the first security loophole (M$ policies you know).

Re:wow... good job at nothing

[pilsner.urquell]

I didn't expect them to have to really change much, but I guess I just expected them to change SOMETHING more than the name.

Yea, right. When has Microsoft done otherwise?

Re:wow... good job at nothing

[MoralHazard]

Did it ever occur to you that they might have modified code other than the UI? Maybe there are non-visible changes to the scanning engine or something, perhaps to enhance the integration with the Windows OS?

Imagine for a moment that the computer is doing more than painting pretty pictures on your monitor (that's the TV-thing on top). Could we agree that a program intended to detect spyware could be substantially modified without altering the appearance to the user?

How did this get modded as "informative"?

Oh, that's right--he bashed MS. Sorry.

Re:wow... good job at nothing

[Tough Love]

Did it ever occur to you that they might have modified code other than the UI?

Frankly, no. It would be entirely out of character for Microsoft.

Re:wow... good job at nothing

[neoform]

Just what exactly are they beta testing?

Dude obviously you don't know the intricacies involved in changing a bitmap.. give these guy's a break!

Re:wow... good job at nothing

[jpetts]

Exactly: the reason they bought Connectix, not VMWare, was that Microsoft and Connectix are both nine letter: they wouldn't need to deal with any pesky offset differences when they did a global search and replace...

Re:wow... good job at nothing

[sl4shd0rk]

>except where you used to see the Giant name, you now see Microsoft.

This is nothing new.
This is innovation.
This is Microsoft.

Re:wow... good job at nothing

[Equinox11]

Yes I'm sure there are many non-visible changes such as an internal (C) Microsoft 2004 statement..

Re:wow... good job at nothing

[Anonymous Coward]

"Just what exactly are they beta testing? I didn't expect them to have to really change much, but I guess I just expected them to change SOMETHING more than the name."

They had to stop it from removing IE and Windows Media Player ;)

Re:wow... good job at nothing

[TummyX]

Exactly: the reason they bought Connectix, not VMWare, was that Microsoft and Connectix are both nine letter: they wouldn't need to deal with any pesky offset differences when they did a global search and replace...


Are you saying they didn't get source code for their money and have to do search and replace on binaries?

Re:wow... good job at nothing

[ImaLamer]

How is this post even on the Slashdot home page? We already knew that this was going to happen because we already heard of the acquisition. Even worse it's just a bad post.

Here is the Slashdot article:
"Broadband Reports mentions Neowin's sneak peek of Microsoft's upcoming anti-spyware software recently acquired community favorite Giant spyware; Microsoft has code-named their re-hashed version of that software 'Atlanta.' It is currently in an internal beta test. There are screenshots of the application in action."


Which is a bad re-write of the Broadband Reports article:
Neowin has a sneak peek of Microsoft's upcoming anti-spyware software that's currently in an internal beta test in Redmond. The site also has some screenshots of the application in action. Microsoft recently acquired community favorite Giant spyware, and has code-named their re-hashed version of that software "Atlanta".

Worse the real story (sic) at Neowin is not that great and loaded with ads. Even when you RTFA you get screwed on this one. But then again I'm in a fowl mood.

Re:wow... good job at nothing

[bushidocoder]

I'm not disappointed - why would you buy a product to distribute and then rewrite it?

I suspect MS is rebranding the product and testing it internally with as few changes as possible to release it to market faster - They'll likely expand the product later. They did the same thing when they bought Lookout.

Re:wow... good job at nothing

[delus10n0]

I still can't believe I paid for SpamInspector and AntiSpyware. Now they're basically probably both going to be free products, and I've wasted my cash. SpamBayes is free and does what SpamInspector does, only better.

Re:wow... good job at nothing

[Randy Wang]

And all that in the space of a 14Mb download. Efficiency is bliss.

Re:wow... good job at nothing

[Anonymous Coward]

You feel like a duck?

Re:wow... good job at nothing

[Anonymous Coward]

Are you saying you're a colossal fucking retard? You are. Kill yourself. Do it.

Re:wow... good job at nothing

[Anonymous Coward]

I still havn't worked out what improvments Microsoft have made in VPC 2004 other than just breaking a whole bunch of shit. I'm sticking with VPC 5.2 until I can trust Microsoft[1] not to fuck it all up.

[1]: In this instance, trust is relative.

Re:wow... good job at nothing

[kimba]

It's worse than that. If you go to Giant's website it reads:

How is the GIANT AntiSpyware product that I purchased different from the free beta version that Microsoft will be introducing?
The Microsoft anti-spyware beta product will not support Windows 98SE / ME / NT (with SP 3, 4, or 6a). Beta product users will not have access to Online Support and will receive product updates for a limited time period.

Their "re-hashed" version appears to be simply commenting out existing code to give it LESS functionality.

Re:wow... good job at nothing

[Anonymous Coward]

Very good point.
I can see this piece of microsoft software getting owned, just like every other they have written.

Ironic methinks.

[grub]

At the risk of sounding trollish... I think it's more than a bit ironic that MS is now going to bundle spyware when a good chunk of spyware is installed thanks to bugs within the present code. Why not deal with existing issues first?

Oh wait, new bells and whistles are good PR and prompt upgrades.

Re:Ironic methinks.

[Anonymous Coward]

err.. "bundle anti-spyware" my bad..

Re:Ironic methinks.

[beacher]

(Lives in Atlanta) - I just think it's funny. Sherman burned Atlanta (almost) to the ground. I just wonder if someone will name a piece of spyware Sherman and watch it raze Atlanta again....

THE SOUTH SHALL FORMAT AGAIN!
-B

Re:Ironic methinks.

[confusion]

Part of my thinks the irony is abusrd - they are going to great lengths to fix a problem they created in the first place. But, the reality is that no matter how good they got, there will always be some holes that spyware gets in through, maybe not as many or as frequent. Also, it's hard to keep people from clicking "yes".

Jerry
http://www.syslog.org/

Re:Ironic methinks.

[Class Act Dynamo]

I think what we overlook is that a tiny percentage of Window's users probably knows what is going down with MS buying Giant or that Windows has many problems which are amenable to spy/malware distributors. To most, it will look like MS providing help against the evil spyware people (I am not saying they aren't bad) against which they are otherwise powerless.

Re:Ironic methinks.

[VoiceOfRaisin]

ill have to disagree with this. im pretty sure most spyware is installed manually. of course people dont know its in the installer they are using. but its not due to any holes in windows, its a regular manual install..

Re:Ironic methinks.

[coolsva]

They don't do anything, they get blamed, try to do something, they get blamed. Come out of the MS bashing mentality to see that they are trying to resolve the issue. The only reason spyware is so prevalent in IE is because of monoculture, nothing to do with engineering

Re:Ironic methinks.

[lachlan76]

I just wonder if someone will name a piece of spyware Sherman and watch it raze Atlanta again....


Sherman own Kazaa :P

Re:Ironic methinks.

[Anonymous Coward]

ah - that gave me a good belly laugh ;o)

Re:Ironic methinks.

[Anonymous Coward]

You're kidding...right?

Re:Ironic methinks.

[SilverspurG]

It's not MS bashing. It's an observation of a fact of life in every business sector. Profits will always supersede quality. Any PR attempt to patch quality is just that: A PR ruse for bumping up profits.

This is more or less applicable depending upon the company and the members of upper management but it's nearly universally applicable when a company achieves the power and clout of MS. When a company can buy courts and tell entire international organizations to buzz off no one should attempt to drum up sympathy for them.

Re:Ironic methinks.

[Anonymous Coward]

It's the Microsoft Way - Sell the problem, then sell the solution.

Re:Ironic methinks.

[ack154]

Also, it's hard to keep people from clicking "yes".

I don't think it's so much clicking "yes" for most people (joe user)... it's more of clicking "go away" on things.

Re:Ironic methinks.

[dioscaido]

Have you been missing the stream of patches coming from MS? How are they not dealing with the primary issues?

Even so, please tell me which pieces of spyware exploit legitimate security holes? The "security hole" they exploit is that users run as admin. Hardly a bug in the OS, just a horrifically misguided ease of use 'feature' in the installer. Easily fixed. I've never gotten infected with spyware while running as a Limited user, and neither has my Mom, who has a penchant for running little apps she finds on the web. In the cases where they are malicious, she just gets a protection fault and knows to happily move along to the next little animation.

http://www.techproblemsolver.com/limited.html
h ttp://www.dotnetdevs.com/articles/RunningAsNonAdm in.aspx
http://blogs.msdn.com/aaron_margosis/
ht tp://www.pluralsight.com/keith/book/html/howto_r unasnonadmin.html
http://support.microsoft.com/de fault.aspx?scid=kb; en-us;305780

For the handful that did take advantage of some buffer overflow, please point out those vulnerabilities that remain unpatched through Windows Update.

Re:Ironic methinks.

[Anonymous Coward]

You've never had spyware? Spybot always returns a 100% clean bill of health? bullshit.

Re:Ironic methinks.

[Ralconte]

I felt the irony too, and here's why. Its the damn cheery Win XP layout that just sort of screams at you. You have to download, install, scan, and then (probably) confirm that you want something with an obscure name copied to some obscure directory on your hard disk.

If Microsoft can't plug the hole, why's there a dialog box: "Do you want to uninstall the keylogger?" I think its all these layers and cartoons for something that could just be buried in the OS that may just irk some people.

But those people are all just those wacky Linux/Mozilla geeks, so pay them no mind.

Re:Ironic methinks.

[v1]

It does seem rather silly of them to attack the problem from this end... "An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure" fits here well. Stop the spyware from getting installed, rather than trying to pry it out once it's dug in. This merely seems like common sense to me.

Re:Ironic methinks.

[dioscaido]

If you are referring to things like browser cookies, then I'll accept you caveat and say that I probably have ad cookies lying around, but I'm not too concerned -- it's a fact of life on either browser (I'm in mozilla). I'm talking about the spyware that installs itself everywhere on your machine, intercepts your traffic, adds 'search' bars to browsers, icons to desktops, etc... Those are the real pains in the ass, that even Ad-Aware & Spybot have a hard time getting rid of. Those things can't get anywhere if you are a limited user.

Re:Ironic methinks.

[sharkey]

At the risk of sounding trollish... I think it's more than a bit ironic that MS is now going to bundle spyware

Well, that's to "encourage" you to download the anti-spyware they just bought.

Re:Ironic methinks.

[swb]

The issue is bigger than that; it isn't that there's a specific bug or fault, its in the design and implementation of things like Active X.

Why should a browser EVER make it that easy to run arbitrary code off the net at the user's priviledge level in the native OS?

The only "valid" reason is that it was THE stick to beat Java over the head with and allow web-based applications to run as Windows applications, with all the easy advantages and UI widgets people expected. Java was stuck with it's horrid GUI, while ActiveX looked and felt like a Windows application.

And that reason was only "valid" if you were a Windows product strategist trying to keep the web and Java from eliminating the need for Windows and IE.

So now we have every third web site wanting to run Active X on our machines, often in the "helper" mode to add stuff to our machines so we can see their over-animated web sites that just HAD to be implemented with Flash or Shockwave or worse.

And you wonder how people reflexively hitting "OK" to Active X warnings get infested with spyware and insist it's not MS fault?

Re:Ironic methinks.

[Atrax]

Sherman own Kazaa :P

close, but no cigar

Re:Ironic methinks.

[The-Bus]

Well.

I was part of some focus group thing (online) that MS did and they asked me how to improve Windows Update. I told them to make Windows more secure. Failing that, they need to make stuff to fix the problems they caused. Not Giant. Not Lavasoft. Not Patrick Kolla.

Microsoft.

Re:Ironic methinks.

[Anonymous Coward]

Thats the way it USED to be.

Current infections ride the IE train straight to your registry. No approval or assistance needed.

Re:Ironic methinks.

[Anonymous Coward]

The only reason spyware is so prevalent in IE is because of monoculture, nothing to do with engineering

I guess it couldn't be how insanely easy IE makes it to infect a windows machine?

I forget where but someone pointed out that 2/3's of the servers are Apache. So where are all the apache server worms? The monoculture excuse is just that, an excuse.

Re:Ironic methinks.

[duffahtolla]

This deserves to be a T-Shirt.

Re:Ironic methinks.

[Jjeff1]

I disupute the limited user part. Working in a school, where students and teachers certainly do NOT run as local admin on their windows machines, we still get spyware.

Re:Ironic methinks.

[_Sprocket_]

They don't do anything, they get blamed, try to do something, they get blamed. Come out of the MS bashing mentality to see that they are trying to resolve the issue. The only reason spyware is so prevalent in IE is because of monoculture, nothing to do with engineering

Keep in mind that a good amount of Microsoft criticism (call it "bashing" if you want) is due to their engineering choices. Those choices lead to the outcomes critics predicted. Which in turn leads to a wasteland of broadband zombies.

When Microsoft attempts bandaid solutions, there is more criticism. That isn't bashing. It's pointing out that Microsoft has issues - much of their own doing.

Sure - they're doing something. But is "doing something" really solving the problem?

Re:Ironic methinks.

[drsmithy]

Why should a browser EVER make it that easy to run arbitrary code off the net at the user's priviledge level in the native OS?

Because "the net" is not always the inherently untrustworthy, malcious code-laden Internet, but is often an inherently trusted, managed and private *Intra*net. Making stuff on said Intranet easily and/or transparently usable/installable/upgradeable is an ease-of-use feature.

And you wonder how people reflexively hitting "OK" to Active X warnings get infested with spyware and insist it's not MS fault?

It's not Microsoft's fault people deliberately install malicious Active X controls any more than it would be their fault if customers deliberately ran something called "iamavirusinstallmeandloseallyourdata.exe" they got from download.com, or it's RedHat's fault if some Linux user installs an arbitrary RPM that adds their system to a botnet.

Re:Ironic methinks.

[Anonymous Coward]

>> spyware is installed thanks to bugs within the present code

I don't know if this will sound trollish, but most of the spyware I deal with as a Windows Admin is installed, full willing, by the user. 'God I want that screensaver!', 'Wow, cursors?', 'I can't believe that the chipmunk can surf!' kind of thing. The EULA states that they, the folks that write the software, can shove a HUGE telescope up your butt, lubricants not included. The end user just want to know where to sign... All we the Admins of the world can do is lock down machines, educate the users, and hope like hell.

Re:Ironic methinks.

[CritterNYC]

Also, it's hard to keep people from clicking "yes".

You don't have to click YES or ACCEPT to get spyware in IE. All you have to do is visit a specific website... or a website that's been hacked... or a website that shows ads from a network that's been hacked... and it will auto-install it for you through one of IE's lovely unpatched exploits.

I just cleaned 12 off my sister's Win98 laptop and then promptly installed Firefox and Thunderbird.

Re:Ironic methinks.

[lachlan76]

Oops, my bad.

Re:Ironic methinks.

[Cabriel]

Actually, it's easier for them to remove the spyware than to track down every instance of vague exploits in their code to prevent unwanted spyware.

Even so, say it were easier for them to fix the bugs, what about the spyware that people agree to? When they download a program, a great number of users don't read what's being installed because they assume it's just what they wanted or that it won't ruin their system. These don't occur because of bugs, so how do you fix that in code? As above, Anti-spyware tools are the most efficient method of removal/prevention.

Re:Ironic methinks.

[omeomi]

Even so, please tell me which pieces of spyware exploit legitimate security holes? The "security hole" they exploit is that users run as admin.

It may not be a legitimate security hole, but I know that in Win2k at least, it's a pain in the ass to run in anything but administrator mode. Installing software is "supposed" to be possible to do as long as you have the admin password, but several programs still won't install for one reason or another. So, installing some software requires logging out, logging back in as admin, installing, logging out again, and logging back in as a regular user...then discovering that you neglected to choose "install for all users", and going through the whole process again. I know it's not supposed to work that way, but I've had the experience at least a couple of times.

That, and the non-admin mode isn't exactly secure anyway...anybody here never been to a university computer lab and have AIM pop up as soon as you log in? Windows' handling of multiple users is crap when compared to Linux or OS X.

Of course, my comments are based on Windows 2000...I've never really used Windows XP, with the exception of checking my email or something on someone else's computer...

Re:Ironic methinks.

[Bega]

Yes. Try is the keyword. But I'd think that instead of making a cheese with holes and fill up the holes with bubble gum, I'd make a cheese without holes.

Re:Ironic methinks.

[imroy]

Precisely. The confirmation dialog box has become so common now that clicking "yes" or "ok" or something similar has become a pavlovian response for many. And Microsoft seems to think that this is an acceptable "security measure", or at least that most people will think it's acceptable.

For a long time, Microsoft's standard response to the latest security hole was to add more confirmation dialog boxes instead of fixing the underlying issues. Well, now you can hardly do anything in Windows/Explorer/Outlook/Office without being harassed by little dialog boxes asking "Are you sure you want to <insert seemingly minor operation here>?".

Re:Ironic methinks.

[dr.badass]

Why not deal with existing issues first?

Because that would mean admitting responsibility. At present, Microsoft can still rely on the myth that Windows' continual security problems are do to monoculture and basically being a big target.

It would also piss off developers of spyware and anti-spyware, and if there is anything that Microsoft is reluctant to do, it's scare of developers, even if it's at the expense of the user's experience. Remember Ballmer's "Developers! Developers! Developers!"? That's where the focus is.

Re:Ironic methinks.

[Tim C]

A sizeable proportion of malware is installed piggybacking on legitimate apps (eg Kazaa) or as a trojan (eg lots and lots of those little systray apps).

In what way is any of that MS's fault? Even with a 100% bug-free OS (which is all-but impossible), there is *nothing* MS could do to prevent users from installing software. I'll give you that IE bugs, etc, are responsible for a lot of malware infections, but by no means all of them.

Re:Ironic methinks.

[dioscaido]

I agree, active-x on the net was a bad idea. SP2 disables it automatically. As was stated by drsmithy, active-x is quite extensively used in intranet situations and is very useful.

Re:Ironic methinks.

[dioscaido]

I'm not sure what you mean in your first paragraph. Was "run as..." not working when installing an application? What application was it? I didn't come across that problem while running as limited in 2k, although granted that was only for a year or so until I upgraded to XP. The 'install for all users' confusion isn't a problem with windows, but a problem with the installation script for the program you were installing. You seem to be blaming inconsistencies in 3rd party software on the OS.

What do you mean by non-admin mode not being secure? Please clarify.

Thanks!

Re:Ironic methinks.

[oliverthered]

'Because "the net" is not always the inherently untrustworthy, malcious code-laden Internet, but is often an inherently trusted, managed and private *Intra*net. Making stuff on said Intranet easily and/or transparently usable/installable/upgradeable is an ease-of-use feature.'

Trust/security levels in IE aren't good enough for that to be a valid argument in favour of ActiveX in IE, and how does that validate Flash, Shockwave and Georges Best 3D Spyware Renederer

Also, it's easy to get system level access from java with the correct security permissions, and Java's security is a lot more fine grained.

"It's not Microsoft's fault people deliberately install malicious Active X controls any more than it would be their fault if customers deliberately ran something called "iamavirusinstallmeandloseallyourdata.exe" they got from download.com, or it's RedHat's fault if some Linux user installs an arbitrary RPM that adds their system to a botnet."

If I went round giving kids knifes it wouldn't be my fault if they stabbed themselves in the foot and no one ever kills someone with a gun purchased from a Gun shop.

It is neglect of the part of Microsoft, they won't release API documentation or the Source code because that could be 'dangerous!' but they make it easy to run arbitrary code as system level.

I do think that redhat should lock-down RHL a lot more though (deamons not run as root, more fine grained permissions, RPM permissions etc...) that way it could tell you what privilages the installed package needed, and give you a strong warning if it needed root for anything.

Re:Ironic methinks.

[nanoakron]

Why is there not an option in IE that reads 'Never accept certificates/whatever from this site'?

There's the 'Yes, this once' and 'Yes, always' and 'No, this once' but not that 'Never' option...

-Nano.

Re:Ironic methinks.

[squiggleslash]

While Java may have been Microsoft's target, what ActiveX actually displaced - and Microsoft ultimately deliberately turned off support for once ActiveX was popular enough - were browser plug-ins. The technology was always more suited to replacing plug-ins than it was Java, which was more than just a rich-content system for web-browsers.

Browser plug-ins were just as insecure as ActiveX. Indeed, ActiveX at least had that almost useless signing system, when plug-ins didn't even have that fig-leaf of security..

So I'm not sure I agree with the argument that some-how Microsoft invented this particular security issue. Netscape invented it. Microsoft just innovated. ;-)

Re:Ironic methinks.

[Anonymous Coward]

How is this insightful?

Re:Ironic methinks.

[Phisbut]

Precisely. The confirmation dialog box has become so common now that clicking "yes" or "ok" or something similar has become a pavlovian response for many.

This is oh so true. I can't count how many times my mother in law came to me saying that her computer had a problem and popped an error, then when I ask her what was the error message, she says "I don't know, I didn't read it, I just clicked on Yes to make it go away"... *sigh*

People should need to get a licence in order to use a computer.

Re:Ironic methinks.

[omeomi]

Was "run as..." not working when installing an application?

No, "run as..." would not work as it was supposed to. Most of the time it did work, but there were at least a couple of times where the installation would fail. I don't remember offhand which applications this was a problem with, and I gave up running as a non-admin a long time ago. Yes, this is a problem with the 3rd party software's installation script...however, it still makes running as a non-admin a pain in the ass, and so I don't do it (on Windows, I run as a regular user on OSX and Linux)

The 'install for all users' confusion isn't a problem with windows, but a problem with the installation script for the program you were installing. You seem to be blaming inconsistencies in 3rd party software on the OS.

No, I'm not. I'm blaming the OS, because the OS shouldn't let 3rd party software be installed at all by non-administrators, and in the case that it does let something be installed, it should not ever be installed for all users by anyone but an administrator.

Re:Ironic methinks.

[Taladar]

As the one central authority for Windows they could (theoretically; if they were more trustworthy and wanted to do The Right Thing (TM)) build a central Database of Windows Software with User Votes wether this Software installs some shit, on which Windows Versions it works,...

Re:Ironic methinks.

[Anonymous Coward]

There may be nothing they can do to inhibit people installing software, but they could have easily implemented a proper userland that keeps the user from destroying the system by installing crap.

It's analogous to the recent Mac bugware hype. Except with the Mac not only does the user have to conciously accept the installation of the malware (It came up as a second please install me) they had to give the Administrator password that came with a serious warning about the possible results/why a second permission was asked for.

On my favorite poison (Gentoo) I can install anything I want, and only ever kill my account. It takes me maybe 10 minutes to re-invent myself. Most of that is digging out my laptop and firing it up to telnet in and re-build my account. Viruses.. I'm sure there are some that may actually be efective. Trojans, possibly. Malware/Adware/Spyware Next to non-existant because of simple user/system safeguards.

Re:Ironic methinks.

[dioscaido]

I'm still having problems understanding what you are getting at. Windows 2000/XP doesn't allow non-administrators install applications. This is why you need to use "run as..." or log-in as an administrator to perform installs. It's the same in linux and in OSX. Where's the inconsistency?

It sucks that "run as..." wasn't working well in win2k. If you are in XP, give it another shot. It works great, and will save you a lot of pain, believe me.

Re:Ironic methinks.

[swb]

Because "the net" is not always the inherently untrustworthy, malcious code-laden Internet, but is often an inherently trusted, managed and private *Intra*net. Making stuff on said Intranet easily and/or transparently usable/installable/upgradeable is an ease-of-use feature.

That is the near-verbatim MS response to this problem, as well as clearly demonstrating a lack of vision or understanding as to the value or purpose in a web browser or web at all. People have them to connect to the World Wide Web, not the "office-wide web", and there's just no granularity of control as to what gets run or what environment or priviledges it gets run as. It's the usual Microsoft "ship-it-as-fully-enabled" zero security BS that they've always had.

It's not MS fault that people DO install malicious Active X controls, it's MS fault that people CAN install malicious ActiveX controls because there's no good security for accepting Active X controls and no security at all as to what execution space they run in.

Re:Ironic methinks.

[dioscaido]

What spyware are they getting? It would really be interesting to see spyware that bypasses LUA restrictions. At this point my research hasn't come up with any spyware that doesn't at least require access to write to HKLM in the registry. I'd like to be prepared if there are LUA spyware out in the wild!

Re:Ironic methinks.

[Anonymous Coward]

I think this is still a great security enhancement, for various reasons - including restrictions on the system directories, restrictions on the registry, the inability to install drivers (which run in Kernel mode, thus having access to the system memory), and various other restrictions.

Disable shell scripting (ie. VBS) along the way. You likely don't need that, unless you are an admin :
HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows Script Host\Enabled = 0

Re:Ironic methinks.

[Jjeff1]

I just cleaned up something called Wintools for IE. Among other things, it reinstalls itself if you try and remove it, and runs partially as a Windows service named "Wintools for IE Service".

Additionally this machine had some IE toolbars.
Here's my top 10 list of viruses/adware as detected by Trend Antivirus. As you can see, we're pretty much "virus" free, though the spyware viruses are rampant.

1. ADW_HUNTBAR.A
2. ADW_ENVOLO.A
3. ADW_EZULA.A
4. ADW_WINSTOOL.B
5. SPYW_KEENVAL.A
6. ADW_SAHAGENT.B
7. SPYW_BISPY.A
8. ADW_BINET.A
9. ADW_SAVENOW.A
10. ADW_SAHAGENT.A

If you search here you can see what toolbars or other nonesense those infections come from. The vast majority of those infections are on PCs on which users have no special rights at all.

Re:Ironic methinks.

[VGPowerlord]

As far as I know, anyone can install programs on Windows 2k/XP... just not to the Program Files directory or if it requires writing file to the Windows directory structure.

In theory, no userland programs should need write access to the Windows directory structure.

Re:Ironic methinks.

[Grishnakh]

Sure - they're doing something. But is "doing something" really solving the problem?

This reminds me of the allegory of a team of people that's climbing a tree; one of the subordinates says to the leader, "I think we're climbing the wrong tree!". The leader shouts back, "Shut up! We're making progress!"

Re:Ironic methinks.

[Anonymous Coward]

Is it so difficult to understand the concept of multiple approaches to a problem?
Some users install malicious software. MS is trying to indicate to such users that this action could damage their systems. This is one approach. Consider this a user awareness campaign, or a freebie, or a PR tactic. They will probably end up with an online tutorial on how to set things up such that people don't screw their systems up. For example, not running as administrator, not installing adware and spyware, and so forth.
Another approach is to patch vulnerabilities that are reported, exploited, or otherwise discovered. This is a second approach to the same problem. The process is ongoing, as new exploits and vulnerabilities are discovered.
A third approach is to allow users to easily install patches that exploit known vulnerabilities. They already have this one. It's called Windows Automatic Update.
All three of these are necessary in order to secure a system.
First, find a way to remove the greatest security risks (users and unpatched systems) from the equation. If you can do that and still have problems with MS, go ahead and flame them.

Re:Ironic methinks.

[Sarcastic Assassin]

If I had any mod points, I mod down the parent, and mod up the sibling post. Windows Update is hardly the thing that needs improving. Although it's not perfect, and the parent's intentions were good, he should have mentioned the notorious security thing elsewhere. If you weren't invited to participate in a Microsoft focus group (like most of us), you should still let them know what you think of Windows. With all the Microsoft criticism that occurs on Slashdot, I don't know why you don't go straight to the source. Maybe, if enough of us actually spend time and effort, we can write enough clear and thoughful replies to Microsoft to get them to change. A little bonus: while searching for a contact form on Microsoft's website, I found this little nugget: Microsoft Usability Labs. It's essentially a focus group, and registration is open. (If you participate in the surveys [usually an hour or two long, according to the site], you can get something from the gratuity list.) *waits for obligatory, pessimistic child post: "Microsoft is a huge corporation...they don't care about what a bunch of silly Slashdot geeks...they don't know what's best for the average consumer...it would cost Microsoft thousands to fix all their problems...*

Re:Ironic methinks.

[swmccracken]

"Intranet easily and/or transparently usable/installable/upgradeable is an ease-of-use feature"

Except that very very few, if any, intranet based products ever use it. Pretty much everyone's gone back to the traditional "use a web browser as a web browser and do the tricky stuff on the server."

I advocate a 'lockdown' mode for IE; where all the potentially dangerous stuff is completely locked off. Sure, this might break an Intranet, but for a typical home user, who cares?

Re:Ironic methinks.

[cnettel]

AFAIK, all services are listed in HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet\Services. In other words, it's admin-only. Some interaction is allowed indirectly, but if there is a hole to install a new service as limited user exploited in the wild in spyware, that's interesting.

Re:Ironic methinks.

[omeomi]

Windows 2000/XP doesn't allow non-administrators install applications.

I dunno...On a semi-public computer, I've ended up with AIM and WeatherBug and various browser toolbars and all sorts of crap like that which I'd never install.

It sucks that "run as..." wasn't working well in win2k. If you are in XP, give it another shot. It works great, and will save you a lot of pain, believe me.

I thank you, but I honestly don't see how it would save me pain. I can see how it would save *some* people pain, but I've never had a problem where I've accidently installed something that I didn't intend to, and nobody else has access to my computers, other than my wife, and I trust her as well. I have a Linux router with a firewall in between my ISP and the rest of my computers, so I'm more-or-less safe from being owned by a hacker, I don't have IIS running, I run Firefox instead of IE, and there's not a chance I'll install anything unless I know that it's source can be trusted...

Re:Ironic methinks.

[_Sprocket_]

In what way is any of that MS's fault? Even with a 100% bug-free OS (which is all-but impossible), there is *nothing* MS could do to prevent users from installing software. I'll give you that IE bugs, etc, are responsible for a lot of malware infections, but by no means all of them.

Fair enough. Microsoft can't stop people intent on installing software that may damage their system. But what (at least somewhat) credible criticism is claiming that this IS Microsoft's problem?

An MS Linux distribution?

[Anonymous Coward]

Sorry had to be said.

hmm

[Anonymous Coward]

Microsoft Anti-Spyware. Isn't that like Sasser Anti-Virus?

Hate to break it to Microsoft...

[CypherXero]

...but there's already plenty of free alternatives out there. Also, just stop using Internet Explorer. That move right there will cut down at least 90% of all spyware/adware.

Re:Hate to break it to Microsoft...

[zbyte64]

Yes.... just tell that to the normal users that simply use their computer for pr0n or for simple searches
Most people dont know where to get software like firefox or spyware removal - let alone even know it exists
Microsoft will either bundle it for free, increasing the value of their OS (again most people don't know about alternatives) or MS will charge for it, making more $$ - in the end, average joe will think MS is their hero for saving them from spyware (o the irony)

Re:Hate to break it to Microsoft...

[Anonymous Coward]

So are you saying firefox should distribute itself as porn?

Re:Hate to break it to Microsoft...

[Rew190]

That move right there will cut down at least 90% of all spyware/adware.

That statement might be true if the majority of spyware wasn't installed directly by the user's actions and not the browser's.

Re:Hate to break it to Microsoft...

[pla]

but there's already plenty of free alternatives out there

I personally have always used (and liked) AdAware and Spybot, and as much as I hate to admit this about purely commercial software... I recently had a chance to try Giant.

Slower than a DOJ antitrust proceeding against Microsoft, and takes a similarly budensome level of system resources (100% CPU for over half an hour on a Pentium-M 1.7GHz!), but damned if it didn't find two problems both AA and SB had completely missed (completely as in, not just left inactive fragments lying around, but real live active spyware).


Also, just stop using Internet Explorer. That move right there will cut down at least 90% of all spyware/adware.

Agree completely. The above-mentioned two problems that Giant caught - Well, let me first say that I use Mozilla almost exclusively, only loading MSIE (in a maximally-locked-down configuration) perhaps once a month for sites that absolutely will not work (even with the user agent switcher add-on) in Moz/FF. And both the spies that Giant caught had latched on to MSIE.

Sad. I mean, good to see MS address (one of) their current major weaknesses; but sad that they would use something comparable to an antivirus scanner rather than just fix the security flaws that lead to massive spyware infestations in the first place.

What ever happened to SP2 as the end-all to MS's security flaws?

Re:Hate to break it to Microsoft...

[malfunct]

I wish I had points to mod this up. The parent is correct, sp2 pretty effectively stops auto installed components. Have you noticed the little yellow bar? Stuff that gets installed now is mostly people working hard to get it on thier machine. Most "free" programs today install with some sort of adware and most normal users (read as non /. savy users) install all sorts of "cool" free apps.

Re:Hate to break it to Microsoft...

[doorbot.com]

What ever happened to SP2 as the end-all to MS's security flaws?

XP SP2 is searching for the "real security killers" with it's predecessor, Microsoft's Trustworthy Computing.

Why am I reminded of Chris Rock's comments regarding February, when I think of why Microsoft chose that month to focus on security?

Re:Hate to break it to Microsoft...

[bcrowell]

just tell that to the normal users that simply use their computer for pr0n
All you have to do is advertise it correctly:

• BARELY LEGAL web browser -- stops spam!!
• 
  ur WIFE says she wants your big MOZILLA!
  watch firefox PLUG every security HOLE at the same time
  

Re:Hate to break it to Microsoft...

[johnnliu]

Adaware and Spybot doesn't catch everything, in fact, it catches probably less than 50% of the spyware variants out there. That's why most people run multiple versions.

This is not the case for virus scanners, usually one virus scanner is good enough to protect your system.

"free alternatives" will never be as up to date as commercial software. If virus scanner was free, it just wouldn't cut it.

You need people on the look out to develop and catch all the different variants that are popping out like daisies, then, you need to pay these people.

I always thought anti-spyware will be solved by an anti-virus company.

I sometimes wonder if MS bought Giant because Bill got fed up with the spyware.

Re:Hate to break it to Microsoft...

[dj245]

Most people dont know where to get software like firefox or spyware removal - let alone even know it exists Microsoft will either bundle it for free, increasing the value of their OS (again most people don't know about alternatives) or MS will charge for it, making more $$ - in the end, average joe will think MS is their hero for saving them from spyware (o the irony)

No, most people won't care at all and probably won't use it, if it turns out to be a tool like XP CD burning is to most people. If it is mandatory and makes itself annoying to people, the "make it go away" syndrome will make itself shown again.

Re:Hate to break it to Microsoft...

[Anonymous Coward]

Well.. .. A friend of mine.. told me that when he surfs for porn, he always uses FireFox these days.
Why?
Because one-handed surfing is.. apparently.. easier with tabbed interfaces, or so he says.. yeah

Re:Hate to break it to Microsoft...

[MrBoombasticfantasti]

I maintain the computer for a 80+ year woman. All she does use it for is e-mail and playing online bridge and other games.

These games are at the MS GameZone http://zone.msn.com/ and for this you absolutely need Internet Explorer, probably because of heavy use of VB-Script.

So, no possibility to upgrade to FireFox and no chance to keep the machine free of spyware. (Win2k, coz XP won't run on the hardware).

Any pointers to get rid of IE here are greatly appreciated!

Re:Hate to break it to Microsoft...

[Anonymous Coward]

Um, it worked. Looking at securityfocus, the overwhelming majority of the exploits as of late will only work on a non-SP2 Windows XP machine. There are still holes to plug, but a massive internal code review, recompilation with updated tools and the implementation of software data-execution prevention, as well as the basic act of turning the firewall on mean that for SP2 machines, Sasser-like events a thing of the past.

Their most recently released operating system, Windows 2003 Server has had very few security critical issues compared to most Linux distributions in mainstream usage too, and suprise suprise, they used the tricks they'd later roll into SP2 for XP (Reduce attack surface, firewall, code reviewing and compiler updates).

If someone got bitten by four year old kernel exploits, you'd lambast them for not updating. Thats what someone has to do with people running virgin XP installs. No more, no less. Computers dont make mistakes, they're always programmed by humans who inevitably will, and people need to get used to updating their systems.

Re:Hate to break it to Microsoft...

[Aurix]

Win2k, coz XP won't run on the hardware

Why won't XP run on it? Seriously, if it can run 2k, it'll run XP, just turn all/most of the visual settings off.

Re:Hate to break it to Microsoft...

[jago25_98]

As with the firewall it's best to bundle software with your OS so you can control things.

Internet Explorer and MS Messenger being 2 examples that stand out. The kernel and the environment itself is another...

More than an OS, a virtual police empire.

Pay us taxes or we'll class your software as spyware Mr. Stallman.

Re:Hate to break it to Microsoft...

[Anonymous Coward]

Adaware is "free for non-commercial use", which is not exactly "free".

Re:Hate to break it to Microsoft...

[rbochan]

...I use Mozilla almost exclusively, only loading MSIE (in a maximally-locked-down configuration) perhaps once a month for sites that absolutely will not work (even with the user agent switcher add-on) in Moz/FF. And both the spies that Giant caught had latched on to MSIE....


Makes you wonder why those sites "absolutely will not work" without MSIE... hmmm...

Re:Hate to break it to Microsoft...

[dbacher]

This is another case, like the netcraft toolbar, of people guessing at what something does without actually looking at it.

First of all, Microsoft's program monitors 59 different active conditions. These include preventing spyware processes from loading, prventing spyware processes from installing, requiring confirmation for actions such as installing services, and preventing redirection of the HTTP protocol, for example.

It actively prevents spyware from instaling (both known and unknown), and it actively prevents many common attacks against IE. I think this qualifies as "trying to do something to deal with the gaping holes, doesn't it?"

So far as FireFox goes, visit this URL:
http://dict.mozdev.org/installation.html

Click on "dict-0.5.18.xpi" and watch what FireFox does. Visit any untrusted site that uses ActiveX content in Internet Explorer XP SP2, and see what it does.

Identical behavior.

What does an XPI contain?

An XPI contains program code that will run with the same rights as the currently logged in user, and instructions on how to execute it.

In what possible way is that different from ActiveX?

Oh, you got the warning message, right?

So go to the official plug ins page and click one, and note you don't get the warning. This is based not on something strong like an SSL certificate, but based on the SITES URL.

Does that protection mechanism sound at all familiar?

So we don't have digital signatures on the XPI, or some other mechanism to verify its really what it says it is, it gets unrestricted access to do whatever it wants to the browser and to access anything the current user is, and you're gonna say that FireFox blocks spyware?

Give me a break. I love FireFox, I use it as my primary browser on every computer that I have, but just look at the facts. There is no difference between an ActiveX control in a cab file or a XPCOM control in an XPI file, except the latter can have variations for multiple operating systems and processor architectures and pick the correct one automatically.

You can't remove the capability to make plug ins for the browser, it's central to being able to explore new ideas and try new things without having to alter the browser itself. It's one of the reasons that the browser has been successful, if you have some new service it's easy to integrate it into the browser. If you want to try a new picture format, you can just write a plug in and distribute just the plug in, and people can try it and remove it.

Take a look at your mozilla configuration files. They're in %APPDIR%\Mozilla\FireFox on Windows, or I believe ~/.mozilla/FireFox on Linux/*BSD/*nix. Does it look like it would be hard for an install program to modify the proxy settings, since they are just sitting in an XML file? Does it look like it would be hard for something to add itself to the XPCOM registry, causing any browser using the user's profile to load it?

I'm not going to talk about the system-wide config files, since their location is dependent on where FireFox is installed, but it's pretty obvious it will take a Spyware author all of 10 minutes to figure out how to get their code into FireFox.

The sole reason it's not been done is that there isn't an audience for it. As soon as the spyware companies figure out that there is an audience for it, they'll attack it.

Brain asplode!!!

[Anonymous Coward]

Microsoft's upcoming anti-spyware software recently acquired community favorite Giant spyware

Wait, wait... Microsoft is making an anti-spyware app that uses spyware? Seems so appropriate but... Brain.. hurts....

Reads like a bad translation

[drinkypoo]

Microsoft's upcoming anti-spyware software recently acquired community favorite Giant spyware

What? Microsoft's anti-spyware software acquired a company? I wasn't aware software could own something, although you can certainly use software to own something - usually windows.

Editors, is it too much to ask that you edit?

Re:Reads like a bad translation

[eric.t.f.bat]

Yes, it's too much to ask. If the editors had any editing ability, they'd have jobs.

Re:Reads like a bad translation

[RJabelman]

The words are fine; you just have to fix the punctuation! Broadband Reports mentions Neowin's sneak peek of Microsoft's upcoming anti-spyware software: recently acquired community favorite Giant spyware. Microsoft has code-named their re-hashed version of that software 'Atlanta.' It is currently in an internal beta test. There are screenshots of the application in action.

Re:Reads like a bad translation

[Anonymous Coward]

Trapper Keeper. Ready for Hybrid!

Re:Reads like a bad translation

[feronti]

Actually, it's really a giant AI project that has become self-aware. It had to happen, given the chaos that is the windows codebase.

Re:Reads like a bad translation

[benjymouse]

This is the Virus. You are owned!

Unacceptable!

[Anonymous Coward]

As a resident of Atlanta, I resent and am offended by this nomenclature. Where do I file my complaint?

Re:Unacceptable!

[Space_Soldier]

Atlanta sucks. It is one of the ugliest cities I have ever been into. Sadly, I have to go into it every day.

Re:Unacceptable!

[techno-vampire]

Write a trojan that infects it, and name it Sherman.

Re:Unacceptable!

[Anonymous Coward]

At least we have a good NFL team this year.

Re:Unacceptable!

[Geoffreyerffoeg]

Send it as a DMCA complaint to MS's registered agent.

Only problem is that it's going to be a bit hard to find the rightsholder. If I remember my Greek mythology correctly, Atalanta was last alive about, oh, 4000 years ago.

Re:Unacceptable!

[techno-vampire]

Atalanta was last alive about, oh, 4000 years ago.>/i>

Atlanta participated in both the Argosy and the Caladonian Boar Hunt. That was about a generation or so before the Trojan War, making it about 3,000 at most. Still, nice thought.

Re:Unacceptable!

[BorgCopyeditor]

That was about a generation or so before the Trojan War, making it about 3,000 at most.

Just so I've got my history straight, that was the generation whose strongest men were able to lift boulders twice the size of the Argives of the day (according to Nestor), and whose aristocratic sons (like Achilles) would sometimes have centaurs as tutors, right?

Re:Unacceptable!

[techno-vampire]

There's ample evidence that the Trojan War took place. Homer wssn't trying to tell straight-forward history, he was making a good action/adventure story out of it. You'd be surprised how much of the Argosy could actually have happened, if you start out with the idea that it was, at least in part, a trading voyage, and some of the details got exagerated over the years.

Re:Unacceptable!

[mrchaotica]

Damn straight! I was just about to post the same thing.

Re:Unacceptable!

[NardofDoom]

However much Atlanta sucks, Philly is worse.

Re:Unacceptable!

[Anonymous Coward]

People from Georgia can write?

Re:Unacceptable!

[StikyPad]

Here.

Wait two weeks...

[SilverspurG]

And some malicious website will have an exploit which turns this anti-spyware into a remote code execution tool.

Re:Wait two weeks...

[Anonymous Coward]

No, it'll be three or four months, when MS has made some actual changes to the code and crapped it up.

Re:Wait two weeks...

[Anonymous Coward]

You read my mind, brother

Re:Wait two weeks...

[The Lost Supertone]

Now now, this wasn't designed by M$ remember, it's probably significantly more secure than that... give em at least three weeks.

Re:Wait two weeks...

[bug_hunter]

Nothing MS make was designed by them,
DOS, Excel, Front Page, IE
were all originaly bought.

Re:Wait two weeks...

[Anonymous Coward]

What about Solitare or notepad? we all know how M$ likes to right high qulity programs

Re:Wait two weeks...

[shimen]

they also bought those ms-games.
there is only one thing ms didn't buy and that is air.

Re:Wait two weeks...

[Anonymous Coward]

This is windows we're talking about. You will be EXPECTED to visit windows update on a regular basis to update your anti-spyware to prevent malicious code execution. Basically like you do for windows right now... er, wait a minute.

Needs improvement

[EvilStein]

The anti spyware didn't do a very good job of stopping the spies from getting out screenshots, dang it...

If it works..

[skinfitz]

If it works, is free and can be deployed and controlled via Active Directory GPOs I am going to be a happy man for the enterprise.

Anyone know if it IS going to be free?

Re:If it works..

[envelope]

I can't imagine that they could charge for it, what with all the free alternatives out there. And their strategy usually is to give stuff away in order to force the competition out of business.

Re:If it works..

[waa]

Of course it is free.

The first one's always free.

Re:If it works..

[wwahammy]

My impression that a home user version would be free but an enterprise version that can be controlled by an administrator and such was going to be charged for. I could be wrong though.

Re:If it works..

[burns210]

I bet you a dime it will be less effective then ad-aware or spybot SD (neither of which is complete in itself).

Fx ActiveX, then come talk to me. Why try and fix the effect, and you can cure the cause? What a dumb ass way of attacking a problem.

Re:If it works..

[Anonymous Coward]

You'd be happy if you were using something else but Microsoft flawed software.

Re:If it works..

[illtud]

If it works, is free and can be deployed and controlled via Active Directory GPOs I am going to be a happy man for the enterprise.

Anyone know if it IS going to be free?

Having a GPO aware anti-spyware would be good, but I doubt if MS would be allowed to make it free. Certainly I don't think they could bundle it with the OS, because they'd kill the anti-spyware industry at a stroke. Leveraging a monopoly, anybody?

Re:If it works..

[SirSmiley]

I believe I read that the beta will be free and once they decide on the popularity and such, it will be on a subscription basis that will be updated via windowsupdate and purchased with a credit card (or perhaps in the store in a boxed version as well).

How long till the MS antivirus is purchasable through windowsupdate as well? They seem to be dragging their feet . I recall they purchased an AV program a while back.

IIRC they had an antivirus program back in the days of DOS and win 3.1 too

Re:And the motto to go with it...

[symbolic]

"They won't be spying, because we will.

I see Microsoft is taking the Apple approach

[Gay Nigger]

and buying out small software firms so they can rebadge their software as their own.

Not that there's anything wrong with that - spyware is a serious problem for many Windows users, so it's good to see that Microsoft is being proactive about it and probably building these measures into their next OS release. They employ some of the smartest coders on earth there so it's not really a stretch to expect that they'll get the job done with this newest acquisition.

Re:I see Microsoft is taking the Apple approach

[Space_Soldier]

Were you born yesterday? Microsoft has been doing this since before Microsoft existed.

Re:I see Microsoft is taking the Apple approach

[Anonymous Coward]

Were you born yesterday? Microsoft has been doing this since before Microsoft existed.

Cunning bastards.

Coral Caches Of The Pics

[Anonymous Coward]

Posted AC of course:

http://www.neowin.net.nyud.net:8090/staff/creamhac kered/atlanta/install1.PNG
http://www.neowin.net.nyud.net:8090/staff/creamhac kered/atlanta/setup1.PNG
http://www.neowin.net.nyud.net:8090/staff/creamhac kered/atlanta/main.PNG
http://www.neowin.net.nyud.net:8090/staff/creamhac kered/atlanta/scan.PNG
http://www.neowin.net.nyud.net:8090/staff/creamhac kered/atlanta/realtime.PNG
http://www.neowin.net.nyud.net:8090/staff/creamhac kered/atlanta/advanced.PNG
http://www.neowin.net.nyud.net:8090/staff/creamhac kered/atlanta/settings.PNG
http://www.neowin.net.nyud.net:8090/staff/creamhac kered/atlanta/popup.PNG
http://www.neowin.net.nyud.net:8090/staff/creamhac kered/atlanta/systemsummary.PNG
http://www.neowin.net.nyud.net:8090/staff/creamhac kered/atlanta/messengerplus.PNG

Re:Coral Caches Of The Pics

[WareW01f]

So am I the only one that thinks step three of the setup screen (SpyNet(TM)) looks like some poor dude standing in front of a bullseye?

No seriously, what's up with the target symbol thingy?

I knew MS was the smart one in the family

[wot.narg]

I always knew MS was the smart one. I mean they were quick to jump on the anti-spyware ball when 99% of spyware targets them. It only took them a few years. Heres a cookie MS.

Switch to a Mac or Linux, and bypass this software

[Joelphil]

thats like giving an arson some matches. people are really going to buy this software and thats hilarious. all they have to do is stop using Windows and use a real computer.

Oh, that's rich.

[philovivero]

Anti-spyware software. From a company that has a proven track record of putting "phone home" code into their software. I'll be sure to run out and install my copy over the already known-good open alternatives.

How much is a license of SCO/Linux again?

Re:Oh, that's rich.

[TheNetAvenger]

From a company that has a proven track record of putting "phone home" code into their software

Wow, it is considered "phone home" code now, even though the user has to open the application themselves, click through 5 screens confirming they want to register or activate.

Wow, this "phone home" code is getting pretty sneaky.

LOL

Codename

[tuxter]

Atlanta? Longhorn? Why don't they just name them after the year they are supposed to be released in... Oh, tried that.... getting rid of vulnerabilities in their software would be a good start hey.

Re:Codename

[Slack3r78]

MS has always used codenames. XP was originally Whistler, 95 was origially Chicago. I imagine Longhorn will take on a different name as well when it goes public, as with this spyware removal tool.

Heh

[bharatk]

Oxymoron (n) A rhetorical figure in which incongruous or contradictory terms are combined, as in Microsoft Anti-Spyware.

No, Microsoft is an INNOVATOR

[Anonymous Coward]

Just think... before Microsoft, was there spyware? No! Now, Microsoft is releasing an anti-spyware application. They created a whole new market and they're just taking advantage of it.

Better colours

[Anonymous Coward]

http://shit.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/01/04/0 051234

Beta testing?

[Rabbi T. White]

Don't Microsoft products usually come fully packaged and sold for high prices in the beta testing stage?

Re:Beta testing?

[jnf]

A bit back, when I bought my first 64b box, I decided to just give 2003 64b edition a try, just to see what it was like. They offer it free for download, or you can pay like 20 USD (price of media/shipping) to have it shipped to you, and its like a 300 day trial or something.

I don't mind paying for software, so long as its not incredibly overpriced (okay well honestly if you think about how much it actually costs to make the product, 80-100 USD isn't terribly bad, but a little pricy for something I really don't even want).

So I bought the 2003 CD's and after a bunch of problems with them sending me XP 64b edition (each time they reshipped at their own expense), I finally got 3 copies of XP 64b edition, and 2003 64B edition, just a little folder sleeve thing for each one, nothing fancy- and it was cheap- and both are still in beta testing. So, in short no- my experience with MS beta software is that its not fully packaged, nor sold for high prices- but this is my only experience with it, your mileage may vary.

Re:Beta testing?

[Rabbi T. White]

I was actually just making a smart-arse remark in regards to the states that they generally release their products... *sigh* Nevermind.

Available through Windows Update?

[REDSECTOR1]

Surely this will be available though Windows Update? If not ... Microsoft fix your damn code first instead of making us pay for your mistakes. *groan*

Re:Available through Windows Update?

[spac3manspiff]

Lemme get this straight.

They make code to get rid of stuff that exploited their exsisting code.

Then whats stopping that code from sucking too?

Re:Available through Windows Update?

[Anonymous Coward]

> Then whats stopping that code from sucking too?

Simple: Because someone else wrote it. :)

Wasted space?

[xpccx]

It seems like there's a lot of wasted space in the top third of the application window. I'm guessing this is slated for XP and not Longhorn so you'd think they'd make it look more like other XP apps.

Re:Wasted space?

[LiquidCoooled]

I think the interface looks clean and uncluttered.
Too often programs overpower the user with options and bumf.
I'm growing to like this softer aproach, and giving information in a human readable, easily digestable manner makes life simpler.

Re:Wasted space?

[nxtr]

If this had been destined for Longhorn, I'm sure the 'Scan' button would take up half of the screen. (...think back button, there you go...)

SpyNet...

[Samah]

Anyone notice in this pic how it mentions SpyNet?
Sounds a little too much like SkyNet to me :)

Reads like a bad translation-Civil war.

[Anonymous Coward]

Maybe this software is responsable for the sacking of Atlanta?

Re:An MS Linux distribution?

[ValiantSoul]

Look no further: Microsoft Linux

Interesting Move

[bogie]

I find this interesting because traditionally Microsoft has always had an open door policy about which software can be installed on Windows. There are many pieces of software that legitimate companies install which users and many anti-spyware companies consider spyware and thus remove. Microsoft up until this point has had no public policy on semi-legit software which users have unwittingly been installing. So now here we have MS now denying them the ability to install their semi-legit software. Will they now be able to sue MS for keeping them off of the Windows platform? Did ms tweak the rules so that companies like Claria can continue to push Gator?

Think about that for a moment. There is plenty of malicious software out there but there is also plenty of "grey" software which drives users nuts but is in reality legal. Is it ok for software to change a user's homepage and install fake ad killers? Can companies no longer sell software which preys on users who are used to quickly hitting the OK button? I'd be interested to know what ISV's Microsoft is now for the first time denying access to Windows even though they develop semi-legit software. Are big legal battles about the start up?

Re:Interesting Move

[LiquidCoooled]

If you look at the images, it shows an example of trapping Messenger Plus.
It gives a description of what the problem is, explains that its not the actual Messenger plus program that has the problem, but the spyware installed around it, there is the option of ignoring it (selected on screenshot).
I cannot tell from the screenshots whether it comes up on ignore by default, but its at least giving more information than previously.

On a slightly different note, in the neowin forum, some folks are saying "i haven't got any adaware hits now I'm using Firefox, but couldn't part of that be Adaware ONLY looking at the IE cache, and not the firefox one?
After all, 90% of the crap Adaware ever moans about is data mining cookies.

Re:Interesting Move

[the-build-chicken]

it's been rumoured that Microsoft is purposely acting anti-competitively against spyware makers to force the entire slashdot populations heads to explode trying to figure out which side to take.

It's as if millions of ultra left wing nutjobs were suddenly silenced.

oh take a joke :)

Re:Interesting Move

[techno-vampire]

Adaware also has occasional false positives. It thinks a drerectory under Eudora is for spyware because that's where Eudora itself stores advertisements it downloads. If you nuke the folder, Eudora recreates it. I've got it marked as Ignore.

Re:Interesting Move

[Anonymous Coward]

How is that a false positive?

It found advertising crud, which is what it's designed to do.

How long until the EU considers this a monopoly?

[PornMaster]

If Microsoft adds an anti-spyware tool free to Windows, how long until Mario Monte declares MS's move as an illegal monopolistic practice?

Re:Switch to a Mac or Linux, and bypass this softw

[Anonymous Coward]

Okay, so 90% of the world doesn't use real computers, eh? I suppose you think the only real computers are the toys many geeks have running Linux, or the non-interactive servers running RH. With blinders like that, you'll never contribute much, neither will your fellow Linux zealots. I wonder what people were using long before Linus/x came along? OMG! You mean there were computers before Linus/x?

admitting defeat?

[OmniVector]

i think the worst part about microsoft of all people releasing antispyware software, is that they are admitting their OS is easily hijacked. spyware is a worse problem than viruses now a days (since every machine i've cleaned up for friends has 200+ pieces of spyware littered around their machine), and for the most part it is easier to prevent! stop using IE, and stop installing random software off the web.

Re:admitting defeat?

[DaHat]

And it is impossible for spyware or viruses to target Linux or Firefox?

Re:admitting defeat?

[Mortlath]

Spyware is more of a user problem than anything else.

I use IE, and I'm spyware clean. When little boxes come up asking me if I want to install a program, I "just say no."

ActiveX can be a powerful tool. Users just need to be smart. But if a user can't handle it, their is an option to turn ActiveX off in IE.

Re:admitting defeat?

[ScrewMaster]

Anything that requires awareness or discipline on the part of the bulk of users is doomed to fail. Too many people like the eye candy that they get from installing those random pieces of software off the Web. Not much is going to change that.

Re:admitting defeat?

[Anonymous Coward]

But Bill - do you expect people to understand something as complex and esoteric as a general purpose computing device with all the decent management tools deliberately buried?
Do you really think it was a wise decision to make the default user an administrator?
Do you know about all of those self-installing pieces of spyware shit that didn't require any user intervention?
You want all of the benefits of selling something to the general public when you knew they couldn't possibly use it correctly, and you want none of the responsibility. Asshole.

Re:admitting defeat?

[semifamous]

I only hope you're running Windows XP with Service Pack 2 or this could happen to you even without clicking "OK" on some installer windows...

Re:admitting defeat?

[bnenning]

Anything that requires awareness or discipline on the part of the bulk of users is doomed to fail.

100% correct. Spyware doesn't *need* insecure-by-design features like ActiveX to spread, that just makes it easier. Social engineering is always going to be available, and if Linux or Mac OS X became sufficiently mainstream then will be problems there as well (probably not to the same extent, but they will exist). The only solution I can see is sandboxing with fine-grained access permissions. The spiffy cursor pack you downloaded has no business looking at your address book or opening any network connections.

Re:admitting defeat?

[Indy Media Watch]

i think the worst part about microsoft of all people releasing antispyware software, is that they are admitting their OS is easily hijacked.

Really? I think that's the best part.

Admitting to the problem is the first step toward fixing the problem.

Re:admitting defeat?

[Anonymous Coward]

No, that not the worst part. The worst part still is that Microsoft has recommended to use Gator to save your personal information and passwords. That happened 2-3 years ago here in Finland, when a Microsoft-sponsored 'Small brochure about Internet security' was delivered to every home. They surely have nice way to do things.

Re:admitting defeat?

[Sj0]

Certainly more difficult. Ignoring linux for the moment, firefox is designed in a way which makes it more difficult for websites to do undesirable things. I think you'll see more examples of this as "advertisers" try to exploit it because it's market share is increasing.

Re:admitting defeat?

[TomorrowPlusX]

True, true. But consider, back in the 50's or 60's car makers didn't want to install seatbelts because it implied their cars were unsafe.

Would you prefer we *not* have seat-belts, as an imperative to drive more safely?

Well, I'd like to see everybody on Windows using Firefox and Thunderbird but it isn't going to happen. They might as well have *some* officially sanctioned protection. Nothing to stop them from using the 3rd party spyware tools too.

That said, I'll stick with OS X.

And so as I type this...

[Incoming9000]

.. thousands of mallicious coders are linning up to grab a copy of their newest target.

How long...

[DominoTree]

Just a matter of time before Microsoft starts shipping their own antivirus solution!

Re:How long...

[Anonymous Coward]

before Microsoft starts shipping their own anti-Microsoft solution?

Re:How long until the EU considers this a monopoly

[NanoGator]

"If Microsoft adds an anti-spyware tool free to Windows, how long until Mario Monte declares MS's move as an illegal monopolistic practice?"

Damned if they do, damned if they don't. Pretty lame, eh?

fix disease, not symptons

[Anonymous Coward]

Spyware on Windows (really not an issue on other OSes (yet?)) is a sympton of a problem. Why not fix the platform so it doesn't suffer from these problems instead of adding more software (cruft?) to deal with them? Same idea with anti-virus: why bother including an anti-virus program, why not just make it so the operating system isn't vulnerable (or vulnerability is minimized)?

Or is this too logical and / or too much work?

Re:Already in the works

[Space_Soldier]

They bought RAV (Romanian Anti-Virus), which according some have created the best anti-virus engine last year.

This product supports versions other than XP

[Anonymous Coward]

At least this is a product that supports other distributions than Windows XP, it also supports 9x, NT, and 2000. You can't get IE6 SP2 on anything other than Windows XP, so this is a welcome break to users of other Windows versions who unfortunately don't have the benefit of Microsoft's full support.

Re:This product supports versions other than XP

[Stevyn]

Keep in mind this was purchased from another company where in the real world you have to release products that works on several versions of Windows.

I think this is a step back for microsoft. They should have incorporated this into a service pack. It would make the OS seem stable. It would provide much more value. And it would give people a reason to upgrade (good for microsoft).

I think even the most "I don't give a shit, just make it work" customers may even see this as just a band-aid. This is like Ford putting up a huge guardrail 2 inches in front of the windshield because the seat belts were coming lose and people were flying all over the place.

Excellent move by Microsoft.

[Anonymous Coward]

I can't imagine why anyone could complain. This is great that microsoft is helping people take more control of their computers and remove spyware. Now windows will come with free spyware software, which is better value for the money. It's a win-win situation for the consumer.

Re:Excellent move by Microsoft.

[randallpowell]

How do you know they won't charge for updates to spyware definitions? Why don't they fix the code and help solve the problem instead of removing it endlessly? MONEY!!! Praise Capitialism!

Re:Excellent move by Microsoft.

[Anonymous Coward]

If we didn't have capitalism, then everyone would be using linux as a desktop. That would truely suck.

Re:Excellent move by Microsoft.

[randallpowell]

Yes it would however Linux isn't anti-captialist as people assume. A company can own their own Linux distro even though the kernel is GPLed.

My main comment was that Microsoft, removing most competitors, can sell sloppy code and won't fix it despite the evidence that Windows needs a rewrite. Instead they make money off of those flaws. If MS had more competitors and didn't force OEMs to sell Windows even if people didn't want it, MS woud have better software.

Conflict of interests...

[Gentlewhisper]

Since they are intending to sell this product for.. profit.. does this mean they will have as many security holes as possible in Windoze?

Re:Conflict of interests...

[WJMoore]

Since they are intending to sell this product for.. profit..

I was going to ask whether it was a free download or not. If that's the case then the whole idea pretty much sucks. I find it quite ridiculous that they would chnage for something that is essentially patching flaws in the Windows.

Having got that out of the way it really does look very nicely done, can't really complain about the interface. I would use it... if I had a use for such things.

Why MS has the advantage

[SamMichaels]

They wrote the operating system. They already know about the next security flaw....they already know about the next big worm. They just won't act upon it until someone on the outside discovers it and/or exploits it. This opens the door to preemptive protection against the spyware that exploits the security flaws.

Besides, the problem with the hijack stuff is that it's increasingly complicated to figure it out inside of MS's nonsense. Who better to offer protection than the people who invented the complexity?

Re:Why MS has the advantage

[domukun367]

I don't think they know about the security flaws or possible worms - it's not a big conspiracy at MS. They're programmers like the rest of us, fighting fires as they come up.

It's like the "UFO conspiracy" that the US government has been executing for the last 50 years - do you really think they're that organised???

Re:Why MS has the advantage

[SamMichaels]

I don't think they know about the security flaws or possible worms - it's not a big conspiracy at MS. They're programmers like the rest of us, fighting fires as they come up.

While this is true to an extent, they provided the fuel for said fires. They also have the best programmers in the world working for them...and lots of them. Rest assured they have a stack of paper sitting there with nothing but bugs yet to be discovered by the public. Fixing them and rolling out a patch may be impractical, but at the very least they can offer some sort of interim damage control by this spyware program.

Re:Why MS has the advantage

[fermion]

The issue is not so much that they know where the next bug will be, because they likely so not, at least in any specific sense, but they have control of the API. They can change it to suite their current needs. They can also use non-standard API, something that would be a significant risk to any other developer.

This has always been the advantage of the OS developer. MS has used to great effect from the days of the original DOS. Apple is using it know to secure the iPod position. Anything their either does not like can be easily broken. No one else can get to the underlying data structures without risking future incompatibilities.

Re:Why MS has the advantage

[nuclear305]

" They wrote the operating system. They already know about the next security flaw....they already know about the next big worm. They just won't act upon it until someone on the outside discovers it and/or exploits it. This opens the door to preemptive protection against the spyware that exploits the security flaws."

Ok...if they know about the next flaw, and the next worm...shouldn't they fix the actual problem instead of "preemptive protection against the spyware?"

If they'd just fix the problem to begin with, we wouldn't need to remove the spyware in the first place. Yes, MS seems to only patch after an exploit is in the wild so it's not possible to patch the problem before it is exploited; in which case any action taken by that time isn't preemptive at all, it's reactive.

Re:Why MS has the advantage

[SamMichaels]

Ok...if they know about the next flaw, and the next worm...shouldn't they fix the actual problem instead of "preemptive protection against the spyware?"

Time, money, reputation. Not going to happen.

Re:Why MS has the advantage

[dn15]

Time, money, reputation. Not going to happen.

Intriguing approach. Release fixes in the form of anti-spyware or anti-virus software and you look like a good guy fighting the evil hackers rather than a clumsy developer covering your mistakes. :)

Re:Why MS has the advantage

[SamMichaels]

Intriguing approach. Release fixes in the form of anti-spyware or anti-virus software and you look like a good guy fighting the evil hackers rather than a clumsy developer covering your mistakes. :)

Gates didn't get his wealth from programming...he got it from being a good businessman ;)

buying isn't fixing

[djupedal]

they are going to great lengths to fix a problem they created in the first place.

The real irony lies in the fact that they (MS) aren't 'fixing' the problem. MS is buying a company that 'fixed' it and passing that off as charitable intent... MS remains clueless outside of pimping.

MS's grad plan?

[SirTalon42]

I know how MS is going to eliminate ALL malware. I figure that they plan to raise attention to the serious issues with just anybody being able to write software, so then they can try and make a licensing program where companies can pay to have their software certified as legit, and the binaries signed (creating a new revenue stream for MS), then once some big companies start following along, keep applying pressure to the ones that don't go along (like them showing up as 'spyware' in their anti-spyware software), then as slowly keep tightening to noose, and eventually require ALL software to be signed by MS.

Ok well this won't actually affect malware, spyware, and adware and viruses, trojans, and worms. ... I need to get myself a tinfoil hat! *goes off and buys one*

Re:MS's grad plan?

[ag4vr]

Hmm...sounds a lot like Palladium to me.

format C: ; Y ; Y

[infonography]

Simple delete everything on your system and install Solaris 10 for X86.

It's so user-unfriendly that nobodys made spyware for it. It's a heck of a lot more reliable then Linux.

Mirrordot links:

[b0lt]

http://mirrordot.org/stories/3a6759da98fd910f392d0 5616b59f866/index.html
http://mirrordot.org/stories/8b19ec436a9f78511e825 e1cbb5dc270/index.html http://mirrordot.org/media/c5260ec181995ef3d472bcc 0049c5a6c/install1.PNG http://mirrordot.org/media/eb8aff4f358a42e5f76f3f8 bc4033936/setup1.PNG http://mirrordot.org/media/e2f7236ee6118616ca5d3e7 80481fc05/main.PNG http://mirrordot.org/media/ad30fb274ef73d1eb4e3e19 35e731e0b/scan.PNG http://mirrordot.org/media/567ec8d3ee764e87c3b3abc e7202fc31/realtime.PNG http://mirrordot.org/media/e84bed90d6eba6c23140568 dfa06d22f/advanced.PNG http://mirrordot.org/media/60bc55064c8ce611ba818f8 5bfff7140/settings.PNG http://mirrordot.org/media/4264b549cd0f19971a66302 a6f33413e/popup.PNG http://mirrordot.org/media/55e411473d3197d267b7ae6 c3d61ba55/systemsummary.PNG http://mirrordot.org/media/eefb9e35a7d478a76b759a9 4e1d57115/messengerplus.PNG

Re:How long until the EU considers this a monopoly

[Anonymous Coward]

well MS created the market in the first place, so they should at least be allowed to profit from it :)

What a great way to fight spyware

[trendescape]

Instead of fixing the problem that allows any program to hibernate in your computer, and makes it a pain to remove due to multiple ways of starting a program up (through services, startup folder, registry, win.ini, and many others) they would rather make a detector.

I love coming home to clean my parents infested computer beyond belief, even after I installed mozilla and "removed" IE.

This is one reason I choose Linux.

Messenger Plus

[tsalem]

Messenger Plus is labelled 'adware', and yet MSN Messenger itself has adware? (bottom of the contact list). Messenger Plus has some neat features to remove the bloat (ads, annoying image links that take up a quarter of) the Contact List as it is.

When installing Messenger Plus, you can agree or disagree to supporting them by having adware thrown all over your PC. I disliked seeing this addition, but just simply disagreed to it to avoid it. Perhaps the person submitting the screens didn't?

(Yes, I'm aware of Gaim, Miranda, yada yada, but to be quite frank Messenger Plus adds a lot of functionality still missing from other chat programs. One of the Messenger Plus features I do like is the ability to "lock" MSN, hiding away all the chat windows and requiring a password to open MSN up again. Handy for those who need to let others on their pc.)

Re:Messenger Plus

[bezza]

There is a difference with ad-ware and having ads in a program. Messenger has adds while you use it, but it does not bother you when you don't. Ad-ware has the effect of doing annoying things while you aren't using the program. That is what seperates the 2.

Re:Messenger Plus

[One Childish N00b]

The problem with MSN Plus! is that when you run it's 'Update' feature, it adds the CoolWebSearch (I think that's what they're still bundling in with it) without the 'Agree or Disagree' menu. Just the regular installer has the option, but the update feature just sprays CWS all over your machine, at least in older versions it did - perhaps Patchou has fixed it by now.

So with behaviour like that I'm glad it's labelled adware, and probably illegal too - seeing as I'd specifically refused to have CWS on my machine beforehand during installation.

Re:Messenger Plus

[Lord d'Eath]

No it doesn't, and it never has done. The auto-update feature merely downloads the same installer from the website and executes it.

The main issue seems to be that when people then run the auto-update they're too busy blindly clicking through the installer to remember not to click accept. People blaming others for their mistakes.. Now where have I seen that before?

Spyware becoming less of an issue..

[Anonymous Coward]

If you have XP SP2 it's difficult to get spyware unless you choose to ignore 2-3 warnings. If you do, well you deserve what you get. At some point end users have to be responsible for their actions.

When I tell people my opinion on spyware they always bring up the infamous grandma example. Grandma doesn't know what she's doing so she clicks yes until those nasty boxes go away. My advice to them is to get her a type writter and some stamps and leave the internet to people who can handle it.

Re:And the motto to go with it...

[3terrabyte]

Now that's funny

treating symptoms?

[jnf]

Well at first glance it seems somewhat silly- as if they are treating the symptoms instead of the problem. Everyone can pretty much agree switching to another browser can alleviate a lot of the problems, or even just mutilating IE so that it becomes a pain in the ass to use (i.e. prompting for confirmation before allowing activex/etc), and thats what happens in 2003 by default (IE becomes a pain the ass to use), but agreed- that doesnt cure all of the problems. For instance, I know I've seen some spyware piggyback in on files played by media player or winamp, or p2p programs (contrary to popular belief kazaa lite appears to be spyware as well, fire up a sniffer and watch the local network). But when you really look at it, solving the problem hardly seems to be the point. Contrary to what a lot of us would like to think, microsoft isn't full of idiots- and a lot could be learned from the 'failure' that is most anti-virus software, namely that signature based detection is not the best way to detect malware. So then you have to sit back and ask yourself why a corporation would follow such tactics if the elimination of spyware/adware was their goal? Money, just like it always is- You don't want to cure the problem because then you start pinching your paycheck. Plus you have the advantage of testing/(further) conditioning the public to subscription based payment methods, and they will thank you for it because you are 'helping' them. IMHO, it just seems like another wolf in sheeps clothing, but thats just my take on it.

Re:treating symptoms?

[dioscaido]

They are certainly treating the symptoms. Not only are vulnerabilities patched as soon as they are found, but MS is taking a proactive approach to keeping their OS secure. Not only through things like SP2, but also many of the vulnerabilities found and disclosed are done so by Microsoft itself, which is something I appreciate (they don't *need* to be telling us about all the vulns they find during code sweeps).

But the fact is, most of the spyware out there makes it onto the computer not through a vulnerability, but because the user presses 'accept' or 'OK' when most prompts come up. So some sort of pro-active measures have to be taken in these cases, similarly to how anti-virus software does to try and thwart the user's innate urge to open the 'superhappyfunball.exe' attached to their e-mail message.

--

Run as limited user, stop getting spyware.

http://www.techproblemsolver.com/limited.html
h ttp://blogs.msdn.com/aaron_margosis/

Re:treating symptoms?

[dantheman82]

I'd guess that few people on Slashdot will give Microsoft credit for SP2 and the help it's been. The firewall has been very helpful for me to know when a program I'm installing is actually connecting to the Internet (for the first time). This is regardless of my browser, and many of the purported problems installing SP2 were nonissues for me.

Personally, I really wouldn't trust IE as far as ActiveX controls go, which is why I use Firefox. But, there are some developers who are still programming using ActiveX controls. Of course, tie-ins with Office, and other MS products was a given for many people and maybe a helpful short-term strategy for Microsoft, but poses many difficulties now.

Some people have no real idea about the effect of "breaking ActiveX" and just jump to that conclusion right away. You know, there is also the point that if you make a mess, you go and clean it up. If ActiveX was poorly written from a security perspective, then it should be fixed because programmers' careers and entire websites build upon the technology (good, bad, or otherwise).

Maybe only those Slashdot users who have left Microsoft know the full extent of this, but chances are they have NDAs keeping them from disclosing a lot of information.

Re:treating symptoms?

[jamstar7]

They are certainly treating the symptoms. Not only are vulnerabilities patched as soon as they are found, but MS is taking a proactive approach to keeping their OS secure. Not only through things like SP2, but also many of the vulnerabilities found and disclosed are done so by Microsoft itself, which is something I appreciate (they don't *need* to be telling us about all the vulns they find during code sweeps).

This is all very well and good, as far as it goes. However one might beg the question as to whether or not Microsoft intentionally allows holes to go through, or if it's just a matter of Marketting pushing a not-ready-for-primetime product out the door in order to keep market position.

Admittedly, the codebase is huge, and would take a team of programmers just this side of forever to audit it. But consider this. Windows 'consultants' make a good living 'fixing' these problems, particularly once they get the coveted MSCE certificate. The code is bulky, kludgy (from codegrafting various things in from technology assimilated over the years), and downright cantankerous at times. This translates into job security for consultants. For instance, a friend of mine IM'ed me about problems she was having with her machine with adware/spyware slowing her browsing down to a crawl. I told her to back everything she could onto CD because when she takes it into the shop, they'll charge her 50 bucks an hour to have a benchrat getting paid 8 bucks an hour to wipe her harddrive and reinstall XP & SP2. The antispyware solutions she'd downloaded and had running (no brand names given) seemed to miss some things, and most benchrats I've run into lately don't have the time or knowledge to use them sufficiently to fix her problems.

My advice to her once they 'fix' her machine? Download and try out a live cd version of Linux, see if it will do everything she needs it to do. And if not, download open source equivilents of the software she uses on a daily basis, like Open Office, Firefox, and the like. This way, if she chooses to stay with Microsoft, at least she can limit her exposure...

How the fuck did this get insightful?

[Anonymous Coward]

And please let me get this one in m2...

Beta 1?

[pilsner.urquell]

Why is it a Beta 1? Are Microsoft programmers so inept that the company is afraid that they will cause wholesale corruption of the product?

Am I the only one?

[techno-vampire]

When I first saw the title of the article, I thought it read "Anti-Microsoft Spyware," and wondered such old news ever got accepted.

just plain wrong

[hawkbug]

This is just wrong - simply a conflict of interests. Microsoft will sell this product I'm sure, and they also sell windows. There is nothing stopping them from ignoring holes in windows that spyware exploit regularily, but wa-la, they now have software to "fix" it up for you at an additional cost. What a bunch of crap.

Re:Already in the works

[Roliverio]

Microsoft did this a long time ago, it was called MSAV, was very BAD..., came with 3.11 or the lastest reworks of DOS 6.22 i think they (as with this "Spyware" solution) re-branded it when buyed from other company..

Don't remember the company name tho...

Re:How long until the EU considers this a monopoly

[NanoGator]

"well MS created the market in the first place, so they should at least be allowed to profit from it :)"

Heh. Yep, just like Honda should profit from the car theft market.

Simple

[Anonymous Coward]

the same reason why everyone else does, can't get a life outside parent's basement other than slashdot. ;)

Just fix Windows...

[Iberian]

I didn't bother to count how many people replied with "Just fix Windows instead of releasing anti-spam and/or anti-viral software." Does this make sense to anyone else. If Microsoft could they would just type the magic code and be done with it, but frankily they just aren't there yet. With millions of lines of code and millions of people looking for some kind of scam there will almost always be a hole somewhere, especially when you have stupid users. So in the mean time putting out free anti-virus/spyware programs is a good way to mitigate the problem.

Re:Just fix Windows...

[Man in Spandex]

it makes perfect sense my friend. They write the buggy software, they should fix it. I wonder if they'll make different editions such as "Free", "Pro", "SuperDuperPro" and add features to each at "X" cost per license Microsoft then makes more cash and last time I checked, cash is good!

Re:Just fix Windows...

[Anonymous Coward]

microsoft makes more money off of tech support calls than from OS sales, you actually think they are going to sell a product or release a patch that will cut into their biggest source of income?

they could stop selling operating systems alltogether and beable to profit as a company off the tech support revenue.

Seems Like a Huge Conflict of Interest

[was_ms_now_linux]

This seems like a huge conflict of interest. Sounds a little bit like buying protection from the local mob. Maybe not as harsh since the threat is real and not originating from them. However, it just seems to be an admission that the flagship product is fundamentally flawed and not secure enough for general use.

Mod parent up!

[sparkz]

Thank you for translating the random words into English! Yet another example of why education helps. (Quick plug for "Lost for Words" by John Humphrys)

Re:Mod parent up!

[drinkypoo]

Amazingly enough I did understand what the story meant, but I continue to harass editors (timothy in particular, since he makes the lion's share of the mistakes, and the tiger's, and the liger's too) when they fail to edit. Slashdot is today an important force in technology journalism, deserved or not.

Re:Already in the works

[DominoTree]

Yes, it was with 3.11, I want to say they licensed it from Trend Micro, but I may be totally wrong.

Re:Reads like a bad translation...

[Anonymous Coward]

No, NO, NO! RTFA!

It sez the software has aquired a Spyware company! ...Microsoft Giant SpyWare... the Next Logical Step beyond IE.

How do you want to be owned today?

Grandma

[ButtNutt]

I think Lavasoft stuff is cool too, but unfortunately having Grandma use it on a regular basis isint realistic. Anything they can do to help would be worth something... My 2c

I can sum it up in 1 word...

[pilsner.urquell]

shameless infantile crooked criminal delusional rebid rogue malign gluttonous amoral

Re:Switch to a Mac or Linux, and bypass this softw

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't be foolish. You've obviously never interacted with Joe users; believe me, the CD-ROM cupholder thing is not a gross exaggeration. Just the other day someone said to me that their inbox (AOL, of course) was screwed up. Why, you ask? Because [there was no scroll bar]. Guess why there was no scrollbar. Correctamundo, because the contents fit on one screen.

As long as browsers allow plugins, joe user will always install them. It's shortsighted to think that Firefox will remain immune from spyware/adware; people can make malicious plugins and the user will ignore the warning dialog box and just install away.

Similarly if malicious linux software asks the user to login as root, guess what, they will. People will do anything to make dialog boxes go away, 99% of the time without reading them.

Besides, it's hard enough to convince Joe user to ditch AOL because of familiarity's sake, much less Windows itself. Ha.

Re:A few things:

[Anonymous Coward]

If you assume Slashdot has 10,000 meta-moderators per day (I know I get to M2 multiple times per day), and the level of posting per day is about 10,000 (roughly what it was the past 24 hours), then there's plenty of M2 being done.

security?

[Anonymous Coward]

Maybe Microsoft should concider purchasing a software security company as well.

http://www.securityfocus.com/bid/12141

This is kind of stupid...

[realmolo]

The solution to the spyware/malware problem is simple, as demonstrated by Firefox-

Disable ActiveX controls.

Is there any legitimate reason for a non-intranet website to use them? Whenever a site requires ActiveX controls to work, I think "Boy, they hired an bunch of idiots to design their site."

They should just modify IE so that ActiveX flat-out doesn't work on any site that isn't explicitly and MANUALLY allowed to by the user or network admin.

Re:This is kind of stupid...

[Anonymous Coward]

Uh, windows update is an activex control.

Re:This is kind of stupid...

[was_ms_now_linux]

But he's right, use of ASP and/or ActiveX is usually a pretty good sign that the people were pretty inexperienced - especially when the site is intended for an internet audience. I guess it comes from historical roots - ASP == A Simple Place.

Re:This is kind of stupid...

[Anonymous Coward]

What does ASP have to do with this? ASP is just a server-side scripting langauge, no worse nor no better than, say, PHP really.

Re:This is kind of stupid...

[Anonymous Coward]

They won't tame activex because it keeps people on IE.

If it's a longshot that your activex control will be run on IE then you'll find a different way. And right now, MS is rather enjoying the fact that sites using activex only work in IE, locking people into the platform.

Professional, seasoned web developers code to w3c and make sure the app works on everything. But there are plenty of noobs out there using activex and so long as they are, MS won't lock activex down. Not while that's the one site keeping aunt bea on IE.

Re:This is kind of stupid...

[was_ms_now_linux]

It's pretty good. I think we're referring to the level of devs that are, or were, drawn to ASP during the web bbom and viewed it as a programming language and wrote massive chunks of logic in VBScript. Now that is funny, admit it.

Re:This is kind of stupid...

[lachlan76]

Update distribution, online virus scanning....but
I'd have to say the disadvantages would outweigh
the benefits.

Re:This is kind of stupid...

[dn15]

I'm sure there are better ways to run OS updates and virus scans than via a web page. :)

Re:This is kind of stupid...

[IchBinEinPenguin]

exactly!
ActiveX is far too powerful (especially given it's weak/non-existant security model) to promote it as a mobile-code solution for the internet.
It's like using flame-throwers instead of matches. Sure, they work, but they're not exactly safe!

Re:This is kind of stupid...

[lachlan76]

In a system where it is IMPOSSIBLE to remove the web browser? Methinks not ;)

Re:This is kind of stupid...

[Jedi Alec]

well, to name an example, some of the games on popcap require ActiveX to play. why exactly, I have no idea, but i do know that when you click somewhere outside the browser window the game automatically pauses. comes in kinda handy when one of those silly customers decides to interrupt a good game.

Re:This is kind of stupid...

[conteXXt]

only problem is this:

when you disable activeX for untrusted zones, spyware adds itself to the trusted zones.

If user can add sites to trusted zones, then spyware can too.

Best Solution? Shut off ActiveX completely. avoid,boycott,complain (to) any sites that are thusly broken.

when active x gets to passport levels of user disdain it will be removable (one would hope)

Hm?

[corrupt2k]

I find it quite ironic that Microsoft is charging for spyware removal software when their faults are what created the holes that make your PC vulnerable to the spyware in the first place.

Re:Hm?

[t_allardyce]

No, ironic is that allot of people will actually buy it.

Re:Hm?

[Xoo]

You're right. It IS Microsoft's fault that their OS is full of holes.

I'm trying to look at the situation from a business standpoint. It's very true that spyware is hurting Microsoft's market share in the browser market, but there are other types of spyware besides ActiveX applets run via exploits in IE. So while MS develops the next version of IE and simultaneously tries to develop Longhorn (with some anti-spyware features), they need to deploy a tool to combat all of the crap that the majority of the tech support phone calls complain about.

I'm no fanboy, and I hate the idea of paying for a tool that ideally should be free, but Microsoft paid a lot of money to acquire Giant, and they need to recoup their losses somehow and justify the purchase from an accounting standpoint. Personally, I'd continue to use BPS Spyware remover in addition to a good anti-virus program. If MS lowers their $100 price point for the software, to maybe somewhere around $19.95, I'd consider picking it up if it works well.

Re:Hm?

[Anonymous Coward]

Are you sure? People are, foremost, cheap. There are better and cheaper antispyware solutions available. Note that this is not the case with other Microsoft strangle-hold products such as IE (free) or Office (no practical competitor).

Once Microsoft legitimizes the problems with their OS, as they are doing by offering this rebranded product, AFAIC it's only a matter of time until the business and mainstream press point out the obvious: that there are better solutions, be it just not using IE or buying the "antispyware solution" from someone with a lower price.

Mark my words, this will not make a lot of cash for Microsoft aside from a possible spasm of impulse buys. Hell, even if they are apparently godlike at the moment, they need to maintain the appearance of serving the stockholders: hence the sort-of timely acquisition. It's a stage show. I wouldn't be surprised to find out that even the clueful analysts inside Microsoft regard this as a counterproductive move, or at best a shaky compromise.

Yes, it possible that they are doing this to make Longhorn more appealing; but if so, why do it now rather than in two years?

Re:Hm?

[corrupt2k]

Instead of paying bundles of money to acquire Giant, they should release patches that correct their mistakes. I just think that it is ridiculous to have to pay (not that I ever will) for Microsoft's coding mistakes. Every other OS manufactuar acknowledges their mistakes and for the most part, supports their customers with free patches. MS should do the same.

Re:Hm?

[t_allardyce]

You underestimate Microsofts marketing capabilities, remember these are the people who sold .NET! If they can't sell it on the shelf, they'll get OEMs to bundle it. They will find a way even if it means advertising on peoples PCs with dodgy IE security hole pop-ups!

Re:Hm?

[Anonymous Coward]

As far as I understand .NET (which is almost not at all), it had enough useful stuff underneath the hype, implemented well enough to be of use to some real Windows developers. This is not the case here.

Bundling with OEM == giving it away free as far as I'm concerned right now.

Advertising with dodgy security hole popups would amount to extortion.

We'll see how it turns out - I still think that the best case for Microsoft would be that everyone, as a consumer, ignores this. We'll see how they market it.

MSAV

[sporty]

Will this be another MSAV? What ever happened to that tool?

Not too far off

[mickyflynn]

I looked at the virus definition database for Norton one time, and 'vmlinuz' was listed. If I actually read the report the shit my school makes us use creates, it pops open the java CLASSPATH file and says a bunch of that stuff is trojan horses.

Re:An MS Linux distribution?

[mickyflynn]

If Microsoft made a new OS based on BSD but with the graphical unity of form that Windows 2000 Pro has, I'd be happy as a clam. OS X has a solid structure, but quite frankly it looks retarded. Even the Apple programmes that come with Panther are not uniform. I have an iBook G4 which I gave to my sister after about 6 months and too my eRacks workstation back and put Win2kPro on it because I couldn't deal with Mail being in Pinstripe, while iChat and Safari are in Brushed Metal. Finder is Brushed Metal, but the bar at the top is in Pinstripe. Apps might be Cocoa or Carbon. Depending, it changes the look. Its the subtle things that bother me.

But the high price of Apple hardware, not to mention the non-serious look of the software, i immagine, would be a detriment to OS X adoption in business. But if the Windows desktop were on top of BSD, it would be like OS X only it'd look professional. It'd be solid. It would go a long way towards improving security. That, or showing that UNIX isn't really that secure either. Either way, it'd be a win-win situation.

Re:And the motto to go with it...

[Anonymous Coward]

your .sig is outdated

This is insane.

[SoupIsGood Food]

This is insane. Spyware stems directly from Microsoft's inability to engineer a secure computing architecture... something =every single one= of its competitors can do. Buying a single anti-spyware product isn't going to fix the problems that make spyware possible in the first place. It will merely offer a false sense of security to the foolish.

It's like tossing a half-full Dixie cup onto a raging housefire you set in the first place. A half-assed placebo to gull the gullible.

Any Mac or Linux user can tell you: Spyware isn't a problem. Windows is a problem.

SoupIsGood Food

Re:This is insane.

[Yaotzin]

There are plenty of wallpapers to remind people. Hehe.

To all ex windows users: Good for you!

Guys...think about it...

[inject_hotmail.com]

If Microsoft wanted you to be happy with your OS, you would be. The idea is to make you just happy enough to want to buy the next one that promises to be better.

A company that makes how many $BILLIONS per year that can't make tight code? Please...

If your car made you 100% happy, it never broke down, it was 100% fuel efficient, and made you coffee too, you would NEVER buy another one. End of revenue stream for the manufacturer. INSTEAD, most autoparts are lack lustre (creating a niche industry for upgrade parts) that break down quickly (1-5years), so they'll need to provide SPARE PARTS for 5+ years. (I am quite sure that spare parts/repairs are the real revenue streams that auto makers like to daydream about)

Trust me, everything is bubbled inside the corporate mandate of planned obsolesence. If everyone was happy with their 486 (same relative x86 architecture as current PC's, no?) there would be no Pentium IV, V, VI...where will it end?

It won't...

It can't...

It's called economy.

inject.

Beta test for holes

[Anonymous Coward]

Why do you think this is a beta version? They have to test the holes that they just installed. Without the exploits it just wouldn't be a Microsoft product.

Antitrust Software

[pyrrho]

I also hear Microsoft is going to come out with software to help the DOJ track Antitrust litigation...

in other news... wolf applies for job as hen house guard.

This is not Microsoft bashing... oh wait... it is! But it's not senseless! I remember when microsoft released an install program that searched your hard drive and sent an index to microsoft servers (I think it was an MSN install, but it might have been something else)... so you see, there is sense to this bashing. Oh, it's easy. Sure. Tooo easy. But ...

Honda profit from stolen cars.

[juuri]

Oh but they do!

For you see any car that is recovered has a minimum amount of damage done to it and sometimes a large amount. The bulk of these repairs will be done using certified Honda parts and many of the repairs will be performed at Honda dealerships.

Eh?

[gmerideth]

I dont get it. Microsoft builds the OS. Builds it in such a bad manner that literally hundreds of flaws are left in it, then...goes and buys a company that made a program to protect against their own OS and uses it?

With the programming team at microsoft they couldn't just write their own and bundle it into the OS thereby knocking all other competing products out of the market?

I'm amazed someone at microsoft thought this was a good idea.

Re:Eh?

[t_allardyce]

Theres only one logical explination.. the whole OS is a spagetti code and they have absolutely no idea whats wrong, how to fix it, and where to start.

An attempt?

[ImaLamer]

In Soviet Russia Microsoft Spys You

Re:An attempt?

[fireman sam]

Well actually it would be:

In Soviet Russia Spyware installs Microsoft

I installed Firefox and......

[qbasicnewbie]

my mom's stupid windoze computer suddenly stopped being able to log in. Hmmm....uninstall IE, install firefox, and windows dies. Hmm...how could this be?!? Oh, right, I forgot, Microsoft XP only plays nice with windoze apps. Oopsies ;-D

Spyware is scary

[Geiger Contraption]

I make sure my computer is free of spyware. I must make sure I'm protected since I am a boylover who posts at http://boychat.org People just don't want to understand people like me. It's a hostile world and spyware just makes it worse.

oh boy

[suezz]

good old microsoft getting rich from it's own piece of crap software. now that's innovation. ballmer is a genious.

GPO? WUS/SUS?

[bolix]

Exactly how is this desktop application going to be managed? More GPO extensions? Can we use WUS/SUS to certify definition updates?

clippy

[fbhua]

"It seems your computer R-E-A-L-L-Y wants you to have an enlarged penis. Do you want me to intervene?"

I look forward to it.

Re:IE is an optional component

[Anonymous Coward]

MSIE and the browsing components are optional and cam be removed with 98lite or XPlite. While MSIE can be removed without issues, to safely remove some of the browsing components (mshtml and some others) you do need to switch to an alternate shell such as the Windows 95 explorer (for Windows 98) or Litestep (2000/XP). Some browsing copmonents like ActiveX support can be completely removed along with MSIE without breaking the default shell, though windowsupdate won't work so you will need Autopatcher XP or something similar.

Easiest way to eliminate Spyware

[io333]

It seems pretty obvious to me that the best way for Microsoft to eliminate spyware would be to take Firefox, rename it Internet Explorer, and be done with it.

Real Men

[azmeith]

dont need no stinking anti-spyware...

Sounds like the stuff the mob does

[bruns]

This sounds an awful lot like what the mob does.

"Pay us protection money, and we'll make sure you no unfortunate accidents happen."

Re:An MS Linux distribution?

[Baricom]

Finder is Brushed Metal, but the bar at the top is in Pinstripe.

That's funny, because Microsoft has the same problem. Click the File menu in a recent version of Microsoft Office, then try the File menu in Windows 2000's Notepad.

What is this "spyware"?

[FuzzyBad-Mofo]

Seriously, I have not experienced a single instance of spyware in four years of Linux usage. I understand that Macintosh users also do not suffer from this issue. It makes me wonder why one would go to such trouble to remove ridiculous trojan programs when it's so much easier to just use a system which does not suffer from the problem?

Re:What is this "spyware"?

[roboneal]

It's called ROI. Why right your piece of spyware crap for maybe 10% of the installed desktops?

Re:What is this "spyware"?

[FuzzyBad-Mofo]

The percentage of installed desktops is only a single factor. After someone "rights" a spyware application for an OS I run (currently Fedora and Gentoo), they would next have to get it integrated into the distribution repository. That's a tall order of business, and not likely that either of them would simply "let them do it," either..

Re:What is this "spyware"?

[Warlock7]

Actually, it's simply much easier to write a piece of spyware/adware for an unprotected OS with tons of exploitable flaws than it is for an OS that is more secure initially.

Most of the spyware writers are not hackers, they are hacks and couldn't write a piece of code that would work under the *NIX flavors out there because they are inherently safer operating systems to begin with.

Of course, running MS crap on these systems has a tendency to allow those OS's to be compromised with alarming frequency too.

I for one...

[eruanno]

I for one don't really appreciate Microsoft insulting my hometown like that. Atlanta is a great city! Don't trash it, Microsoft!

(Sorry, had to... Not a big fan of MS... BIG fan of my city!)

Recommend grammer course

[Anonymous Coward]

Could this sentence be any longer?

Is it even a sentence?

"Broadband Reports mentions Neowin's sneak peek of Microsoft's upcoming anti-spyware software recently acquired community favorite Giant spyware"

Crappy English I expect from the likes of Forbes, CNN or even Laura Dildo, but slashdot should have high standards

Firefox and spy-/adware

[marevan]

People have been hyping about the FireFox here a lot. Even though FireFox has a lot of advantages, the main issue are the pages that the (stupid) user browses. If you are browsing for porn and warez (usually in the pages where "warez" is included in the address of the site and pornsites names are TOO long, not that I'd know of these things :P) you'll end up having ~80 infections with IE and still ~10 with FireFox. So stick to slashdot.org and screw porn.

If I don't trust MS now....

[spamfiltertest]

why would I trust them for Anti-spyware?

Just off the top of my head, I can see their version of "anti-spyware" software telling me that the following are spyware:

Firefox
Google Tool Bar
AIM
Spybot Search and Destroy
Ad-Aware
Sun Java Counsole
Adobe Acrobat
iTunes

Then, after clicking on an option NOT to remove these items, it does it anyway OR makes the MS verions the default on the system.

They are the giant, yes, but some company needs to take back marketshare to prevent MS from doing what they want, when they want, to the "dumb" user's machine... Some company needs to step up and provide a user friendly, wide-distro OS. (All Mac OS not apply - I love them, but they already made their niche)

codenames

[PoopJuggler]

Why does everything have to have a frigging codename nowadays?

My favorite software oxymoron

[Daverd]

... is Microsoft Works.

Re:An MS Linux distribution?

[Anonymous Coward]

The brushed metal vs pinstripe is not a matter of being carbon or cocoa as many non-developers think. Carbon apps are typically brushed metal, however cocoa apps have the choice of the two. The fact that some apps are brushed metal and some aren't just show that they were not made by the same user interface team, and it is up to them what it looks like. OS X and every app in it is very professional and they all follow the guidelines made by Apple for a GUI program...if it is brushed metal or not is not in the guidelines.

rightfully so

[Anonymous Coward]

And rightfully so. She stole it. It's not like she could have "gotten a live recording" or something. It's a program that costs money and Symantec has every right to do everything they can to safeguard their products, Including detecting things that crack it. That said, as it does, detecting any "crack" isn't different than detecting other software that seeks out a specific executable and alters the code. Wouldn't you want your AV to notify you if run32 was being tampered with?

Maybe it's not as userfriendly but if you need an AntiVirus for free getClamWin or something. Don't rip off Symantec, their trying to make a living too.

Re:rightfully so

[Sj0]

What? I'm sorry, your point was lost amongst your nagging.

Re:rightfully so

[Fragglebabe]

He may have been nagging, but to be honest he was making a decent point. I download movies and music just like the next person, but i draw the line at stealing software when there are plenty of good free alternatives around. I personally use AVG on my laptop, and I have never had a problem. It's fast, efficient, checks my mail, and updates on a regular basis.

He may have been nagging, but his point is still valid. With a little research, it's amazing what you can download legally and for free online.

Let's not forget

[GoClick]

BHOs are a FEATURE Oh their not a hole or a bug, no no my friends, they were the careful planning of MS. They're what allow for many great applications out there in the real world, applications that companies use on Intranets all the time. They also allow for re-branding something MS' major partners love. No their not a hole their a money grubbing annoyance.

Basicaly a BHO really is a HELPER just, they aint helping you. Unless you're one of the few people who uses a corporate Intranet that requires one.

Re:Let's not forget

[marevan]

That's like the oldest excuse in the coding world: "That's not a bug! It's a FEATURE!"

Interesting Spyware detected...

[peeon]

None other than Microsoft plus.
http://www.neowin.net/staff/creamhackered/atlanta/ messengerplus.PNG

Re:Interesting Spyware detected...

[whathappenedtomonday]

from the screenshot:
"in either case this software is not to be trusted"

now I'm confused: which software? windows? the AS beta? MS Messenger? all of the above?

Re:Interesting Spyware detected...

[HeliumHigh]

No, it actually caught it properly... MSN "Plus!" is a third-party plugin/addin/mod of sorts, that gives more functionality than the normal MSN messenger. It, of course, comes bundled with spyware.

The sad thing is, I can name each peice it trys to install, where the bad files are placed, and how to get rid of them in the most efficent way... and its 5 AM.... up all night....

LOOK WHAT FLAWS IN MS DID TO ME!!

Those dang flaws... made me post to slashdot....

Re:Interesting Spyware detected...

[StikyPad]

Messenger Plus is unrelated to Microsoft. It's a 3rd party add-on, and, if you read the author's website, it is not spyware. Simply select "I do not agree," to the question of whether to install the additional adware.. Nothing is forced on you, or snuck past you, unless not paying attention to what you're installing counts as sneaking in.

Re:IE is an optional component

[__aatgod8309]

The problem is things that are dependant on IE (windows update does comes to mind, but i doubt there aren't others), and then there are the other interdependent vulnerabilities - but interdependencies are the way MS keeps itself in power. But I'm fond of XPlite myself.

innovation

[Anonymous Coward]

is this the clearest example we've yet seen of Microsoft innovating?

Its not entirely baseless, you know...

[lysium]

Did it ever occur to you that they might have modified code other than the UI?

When Microsoft purchased VirtualPC for Mac, they released a 'major' update that did nothing more than rebrand the product to Microsoft. No improvements, no fixes, just the window dressing. So while these people are certainly bashing Microsoft, there is a kernel of truth in their sarcasm.

Sometimes, you can't upgrade, you *need* IE!

[MrBoombasticfantasti]

I maintain the computer for a 80+ year old woman. All she does use it for is e-mail and playing online bridge and other games.

These games are at the MS GameZone http://zone.msn.com/ and for this you absolutely need Internet Explorer, probably because of heavy use of VB-Script.

So, no possibility to upgrade to FireFox and no chance to keep the machine free of spyware. (Win2k, coz XP won't run on the hardware).

Any pointers to get rid of IE here are greatly appreciated!

Get in line, buddy!

[eMartin]

There are those of us from Cairo, Memphis, Jakarta, Nashville, and a few others already complaining.

This will work until ...

[kiddailey]

This will work until an IE-installed spyware app disables it ;)

Seriously though, the question in my mind is: What does this mean for the existing ad/spyware removal tools? Will they fade into obscurity once Atlanta is bundled with all new installations of the OS?

Who NOT To Invite To Your Focus Group

[Petersko]

I was part of some focus group thing (online) that MS did and they asked me how to improve Windows Update. I told them to make Windows more secure. Failing that, they need to make stuff to fix the problems they caused. Not Giant. Not Lavasoft. Not Patrick Kolla.

So you participated in a focus group... got asked a question... answered with a completely pointless and vague non sequitur ... and blindly went on your way feeling smug.

Well done. Way to be useless.

I'm confused...

[s-meister]

I thought Windows XP was spyware?

Another Good Piece Of Software Ruined

[Cheirdal]

Giant was one of my favorite spyware removal programs. I guess we can count on it being buggy and opening up security holes in the future for us. Everyone should boycott the Microsoft version of this application.

SpyNet..,?

[Shadow_139]

Haha, on the install screen with says "with SpyNet Tecnology"...
How you think they have had copyright on that.., finally found something for the .Net framework,.

Step 1: Design flowed / Bug filled OS and framework for other programs. Step 2: Copyright Spyware removal over .Net / Release crap rip off of free software. Step 3: Profit

Am I missing anything?

----------
"Clutch my testes, bloody squirrel humpers!!" -Happy Noodle Boy

all ready happened

[scenestar]

http://www.neowin.net/staff/creamhackered/atlanta/ messengerplus.PNG

Micro$oft hate others playing around with their apps, a completely harmless msn plugin is set for deletetion, cause it might contain spy
you can opt-out it during installation, as long as you just READ WHATS INSTALLED during setup

Re:all ready happened

[throwaway18]

a completely harmless msn plugin is set for deletetion
Actually one of my jobs this weekend is to look at a machine that is reportedly running very slowly and has a click-here-to-buy-stuff taskbar at the bottom of the screen all the time since someone clicked YES on the "messenger plus install new version" nag box.

MICROSOFTS DEFINITION OF SPYWARE

[scenestar]

according to the microsoft propagandha videos spyware:

1. Bombards you with adds
2. Changes your computers settings
3. collects personal information
4. slows down, or crashes your computer


im sorry to say but thats a bit hypocritical
because
1. windows is riddeledd with microsoft logos slapped on pretty much anything
2. sp2 fsucked up my computer intoways i cannot imagine
3. these fsuckers want to know not only a serial but an entire hardware profile, not to mention those NSA keys
4. im not even going into that

Cool!

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh sweet! I lurrrve the screenshots. Microsoft just rocks!

Re:An MS Linux distribution?

[AaronLawrence]

He said Windows 2000.

Re:PR

[Anonymous Coward]

Interesting that the Slashdot article Failing Grades For Most Anti-Spyware Tools posted (planted?) in late November gave better marks to the Giant product. I was thereby persuaded to download and install, but my experience didn't at all match the glowing satisfaction the review led me to expect.

Shortly after that review appeared and received wide circulation--in spite of community misgivings about the reviewer--Microsoft announces acquisition of Giant.

So it's a mediocre product which has received a lot of recent good publicity. I see PR fingerprints all over this one.

Re:format C: ; Y ; Y

[Jedi Alec]

why bother formatting if you're gonna have to repartition anyway?

-1, Fan club methodology.

[TapeCutter]

Nothing against this particular troll, err, I mean +5 insightfull post. The post just typifies the strange behaviour of a lot of "geeks". So many posts get bogged down (or modded up) in predjudice against one O/S or another (particularly MS stuff since this is Linux territory). I say strange since the posts usally display an intimate knowlage of thier favorite O/S and are full of subjective accusations against thier least-favorite O/S. They pontificate about design, patches, evil empire, etc, but mostly I find those who bitch the loudest have not RTFM.

I call this type of post a "Fan club post". Paid "geeks" that follow this "fan club" mentality are trully ironic since the "fan club" is pure "marketing". They are also doing the proffession a dis-service because they often fail to investigate options offered by "evil empire X". A paid geek should aim for scalable and impartial options when making recommendations. If a particular O/S is considered a bad choice or not worth supporting then explain why (examples: closed source, too few users). Don't just ignore it and then reply "because it sucks" when the pointy-haired manager makes "enquires", possibly in return for PHM's sponsored blow job.

I have worked as a developer for 15yrs in *nix and MS and have found a few bugs in both types of O/S's. However, the vast majority of "bugs" are in the system configuration or application code (the stuff most slashdotters play/work with, ironic?). I have not found any functionality in one O/S that cannot be mimicked in another. Note carefully that I said "mimicked", performance, tools, cost and effort for a particluar O/S will vary depending on the functionality required and the existing environment (if any).

I am sure MS sell lots of copies via OEMs to people who don't know why they need an O/S. Would these same people fair any better if they dusted of the "broken" PC sitting in the corner and installed, say a Linux distro? My guess is many would rather trade it for a PS2 or a big screen TV. The fact is large companies still buy big from MS. Are all these companies spending millions because Bill has cast some sort of evil marketing spell that renders them stupid and opens thier wallet?

-Does anyone know how to switch on my new tin foil hat?

Re:-1, Fan club methodology.

[grub]

Nothing against this particular troll, err, I mean +5 insightfull post.

OK, we know where this is heading.

If a particular O/S is considered a bad choice or not worth supporting then explain why (examples: closed source, too few users). Don't just ignore it and then reply "because it sucks" when the pointy-haired manager makes "enquires", possibly in return for PHM's sponsored blow job. I have worked as a developer for 15yrs in *nix and MS and have found a few bugs in both types of O/S's

I've got 20 years :P Anyhow, nowhere in my original post did I say 'it sucks because it's MS' All I suggested is that they're taking the easy way out. Microsoft has the resources to be proactive with their security. OpenBSD does it with a fraction of a percent of the developers. Why can't MS, with their billions in the bank, do the same? Because that costs money. Being a geek for 15 years you should know that re-writing huge chunks of code is no small task. It's easier (lazier?) in many cases to just buy a Band-Aid and slap it on.

The problem is that MS' stuff has Band-Aids on top of Band-Aids on top of Band-Aids when they should have just amputated the festering limb.

Are all these companies spending millions because Bill has cast some sort of evil marketing spell that renders them stupid and opens thier wallet?

Yes, it's called "advertising". That sells product to PHBs and gets some geeks to get MCSE or other useless paper for their walls.

Re:-1, Fan club methodology.

[TapeCutter]

If they "just amputated the festering limb" they would also amputate alot of thier customers, not a smart bussiness move. If they did amputate the "fan club" will still bitch about selling upgrades because MS is the enemy no matter what they do.

An MCSE is product certification, it is usefull for inexperienced people working with MS, just like SUN certification is usful to people working on Solaris, etc. Personally I prefer to have experienced people with a relevant BSc who can figure out the finer details of mainstream O/S's by RTFM.

SP2 still enables AX by default

[steve_l]

on a clean SP2 build (that is the MSDN WinXP+SP2 all in one install), Prompted ActiveX download is still enabled for the internet zone.

If you turn that off, windows update stops working, as http[s]:*.microsoft.com is in that zone.

I dont call that locking down the browser, To secure IE (even if you only use it for windows update)

1. disable AX download in internet zone

2, edit trusted zone site security to medium. Like you ever need a 'run anything, unprompted' zone.

3. add https:*.microsoft.com and http:*.microsoft.com to the trust zone

4. uncheck the 'require https in trusted zone' switch

the aim is to redefine "trusted" from "total access" to "prompted download active X controls", which is a serious enough undertaking that I dont want to enable it broadly. Only MS sites and spyware vendors seem to use it, after all.

Re:SP2 still enables AX by default

[shimen]

umm wouldn't you add microsoft in the untrusted zone if you knew who you can trust?

Re:SP2 still enables AX by default

[Anonymous Coward]

What about :
Remove ActiveX support from IE
then create a Windows Update application (instead of using IE to do it)

Re:SP2 still enables AX by default

[Anonymous Coward]

What about:
remove M$ crap altogether, and replace with a real operating system.

Why doesn't MS buy an Anit Virus Company??

[carl0ski]

Why on earth did MS since the days of 95 not build or at least buy an Antivirus company? i spose and Adware program is close, but not good enough. Only Microsoft knows the most inner workings of windows the best. Far better then anyone else at detecting viruses and removing virii without breaking things, in thier software. Share resources with the core system (like office does) to lower the resources that some AV programs use norton is a massive burden when it comes to the GUI.

Re:And the motto to go with it...

[Anonymous Coward]

Editing posts is a bad, bad idea. On Slashdot of all places; can you imagine the chaos? There are enough idiots who don't read the entire thread, or who read with some crazy defaults so their threads are all over the place, and we don't need to add to the confusion by allowing trolls to edit their posts to change everything after they've gotten a nice line of responses.

Just use preview and be done whining.

can't remove "69.20.16.183 ieautosearch" from host

[blackest_k]

Well if Microsoft is doing anything to help against spyware it has got to be of some use.

There is a new extreme piece of spyware which seems to have surfaced in the last month.
http://forum.iamnotageek.com/t-78554-1.html
is the start of a very interesting thread concerning what seems to be the latest generation of spyware.
some of the things that it does include generating randomly named dll's
restarting processes that have been killed, runs IE even in safe mode, drags in a whole raft of other spyware to confuse things and leaves the PC it infects after unsuccessful removal unable to connect to the internet.

This thing is really nasty.

I am pretty sure I was dealing with a case of this yesterday. When adaware was installed and ran on a pc with XP service pack2 It triggered a Reboot due to a failure in dcom with a 1 minute countdown. The worst part was after cleaning with adaware the Pc was unable to connect to the internet unable to get an address from the router.

Manually configuring a network address and setting 192.168.2.1 as the gateway got the network working to the lan pc's.
The router could be pinged successfully but it wasn't possible to reach 192.168.2.1 through firefox netscape or IE to check the router status.
and after several hours of trying this pc refused to connect to the internet.

After banging my head against this brickwall over a period of about 12 hours the only solution was to reinstall XP.

This is the worst spyware I have ever seen, according to the thread the initial attack seems to have occured after a search for the song "over and over" by nelly although a precise location of the source of this infection isn't known.

If you have to deal with spyware on a regular basis check this thread out because you are not going to solve this one just by running adaware and spybot S&D.

http://forum.iamnotageek.com/t-78554-3.html

This latest spyware really should be submitted as a story on slashdot it is very new, very nasty and it is going to infect a lot of Pc's.

Please mod this up or investigate this yourself and Post about it.
because this is going to be a major disruption to Pc users everywhere, especially with it's defence of blocking the Pc's internet connection when you attempt to remove it.

Why Micro$oft?

[jeff13]

Why would I bother with security solutions from the company famous for costing my company uncalcuable time, money, and left my data open to any 12 year old bored enough to do damage?

This isn't acceptable software. Period.

Perspective

[tilleyrw]

In Soviet Russia, Computer Monopolist removes your spyware!

Nice screenshots...

[krunchyfrog]

Are they gona make it for Linux any soon? Not that I'll need it, but it looks pretty. Also I'll need to install a new stick of memory since it has "real-time protection".

Re:An MS Linux distribution?

[Anonymous Coward]

All app types have the choice between the two. The Finder is a carbon app and you can have either type of window (brushed metal is used for the all-in-one-window thing, pinstripe (or what they call it today now that it doesn't have stripes - stripes went out with Panther) is used for spacial windows. To switch between the two, click on the pill in the right hand corner.

The default for Carbon apps that do not use .nibs (some do, despite it being from the Cocoa side of the system) is pinstripe, not brushed metal. Take a look at, say, AppleWorks or Microsoft Office, both (in)famous carbon apps, to see what I mean.

Brushed metal, according to the guidelines, is supposed to be for software that provides an interface to some type of hardware or emulates a hardware interface (like a DVD player or calculator.) No, I have no idea why it's being used for the Finder either.

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

How long will it work for?

[duffster]

Leaving aside the questionable irony of this software, I do wonder how well it will work in the long term. One of the problems I've already experienced when removing spyware is programs that hijack the anti-spyware software itself, usually by sabotaging the spyware definition files as soon as they are downloaded.

If Microsoft starts distributing this as standard software, should we expect to see more spyware that avoids removal in this way? Will users have to reinstall the software, or run it from a boot disk, every time they want to clean their system?

Why does MS always "acquire" instead of develop ?

[mgpeter]

Microsoft should have quite a team of developers considering the amount of money they have amassed.

Why do they continue to purchase companies to add to the products that they sell ? Why don't they just develop their own software "from the ground up", especially considering that whenever they buy a company, the resulting products are always sub-par compared with similar competing products.

Re:An MS Linux distribution?

[emilymildew]

I call shenanigans. You're so anal retentive that you gave away a G4 iBook and went BACK to Win2K because of the inconsistencies in the look of OS X?

Dude, that doesn't make sense. Doesn't Windows drive you crazy? I mean, if you're that concerned about appearance. Do you not care about what's going on underneath?

(I'm sorry of this comes off as mean, I'm honestly shocked that that was your response to some little inconsistencies. Really.)

Anti-spyware...from spammers. Nice move.

[Arrogant-Bastard]

This should fill everyone with confidence:

• "Sunbelt Software of Clearwater, Fla., on Friday confirmed reports that it has exclusive rights over certain aspects of the anti-spyware programs Microsoft gained in its acquisition of Giant Company Software on Thursday."

Now go read: SPEWS record 471

which is one of the oldest SPEWS records and thus means that these spammers have been known for quite some time.

Re:Oh hell ya.

[Anonymous Coward]

Sure first post ... Moron

How are they the "leader"?

[Warlock7]

When most haven't even heard of them? Adaware seems to be the most trustworthy standard spyware removal tool from what I understand.

Since MS and Giant say that Giant is the leader, they must be.

Re:How are they the "leader"?

[Anonymous Coward]

Giant's definietly the biggest, hence the name...duh!!!

Re:How are they the "leader"?

[Warlock7]

Oh, of course...

How silly of me.

Classic Design and UI Blunders

[EXTomar]

Also, it's hard to keep people from clicking "yes".

I've complained about this in many of /. post: The problem MS has is that they are constantly presenting the user with the options they shouldn't be able to do an expecting them to not select them. I can't tell which is more dumb: Is it this stuff about investing time and R&D in AV software instead of fixing the bugs and pulling the plug on fundementally flawed software? Or is it presenting the user with this dialog?

Do you wish to run the unsigned Active X control?

Yes No

Instead, MS should change the message to:

Do you wish to ruin your computer and go through a lengthy reinstall?

Yes No

No one should select "Yes" but the fact that MS allows the "Yes" button to appear allows for the event to happen. Simply put, MS designers violate a primary UI Design rule: never present the user with an option that is entirely and every way undesirable.

IE should never run unsigned Active X! In fact I say no one should be using Active X at all because it is an antiquated technology but that is another thread. Don't bother asking the user if they want to run it if it violates security. You can alert the user that you've rejected the Active X but never, ever give them the option to just click it away.

This is just more evidence of MS design problems which they won't fix because it messes with their desktop dominance but are more than happy to sell you more software to shore it up. The problem is that IE continually allows sidesteping of simple (and effective) security principles found in IE and the OS. Instead of fixing this they'll bolt more software ontop of it which will come as a cost to the consumer sometime down the road. It might not be in the form of higher MS software prices (*snort*) but at the cost of killing off various "security ISVs" that do good work bringing attention the problems in Windows.

Re:Classic Design and UI Blunders

[Anonymous Coward]

"IE should never run unsigned Active X!"

Do you actually believe that signing an Active X program makes it secure and safe? Heh.

One word: Linux

[peter303]

So MicroSoft will be abandoning their hopelessly inscure Windows operating system for Linux?
They could layer their GUIs and Office Apps on Linux much as Apple transferred to UNIX. (MS already has Office running under Linux, but refuses to market it.)

Will it delete windows

[freedom_india]

Will it remove Windows(tm) from my system?

Re:An MS Linux distribution?

[mickyflynn]

yes. i can't deael the the ads in AIM. Trillian is fucking ugly. SO i use GAIM. But the WIMP theme is just that little bit off. Now every one is using XP (well, lots of people) and new software is being made to look like XP. That doesn't fit. All and all, i'm no better off than using Linux where half the apps i use need a different toolkit than the desktop i'm using.

I used to care what went on underneath. My first job out of high school was programming on the Free Electron Laser w/ C on Linux at the Thomas Jefferson National Accelerator Facility. I used FreeBSD (2.2.8 on) from the time I was 12 years old (I am 20 now), occasionally dabbling with Slackware. Actually, Redhat 5.2 is still my favourite operating system ever. Now am an English major, not computer science. I got burned out while working for real at it. All i want to do is type my papers, get my email, and yack at my friends. I'm almost like a normal user these days, except I actually know what I am doing. However, the inconsititancies drive me nuts. Like the guy above said, about the difference between Word and Notepad, yeah, it wish that Office 2003 wheren't so fucking shiney looking. They want it to blend with XP. If someone would hook me up with an XP Pro CD, i'd use it and probably never notice anything again. But my Ubuntu installation died on me (sudo broke). Then the Hoary version wouldn't install. So I went back to FreeBSD, my old friend, but for some reason, doing exactly what I had done for years, I couldn't get my retarded s3 integrated video card in this eRacks workstation I bought running FreeBSD when I came to college to work again. I put Debian stable on, and that worked for about an hour until something else pissed me off. My aunt and uncle bought me an mp3 player for Christmas, and so I had to go back to Windows for pragmatic purposes. My school gives us Office 2003, and it's better than Open Office. Pirating Photoshop is easy enough, not that i ever do graphics works, but if i need to i can. My firewall, my anti-virus, and my spybot, my gmail account is good about spam, and my school account is too. I don't have any problems. All my hardware works. That gaim doesn't look quite right i can look past. Actually, i have it transparent with an opacity of 133, so i can't reall see the offending issues with WIMP.

Too late!

[PeanutGallery]

An army of M$ lawyers is already decending on the city to sue for copywright infringrment.

Redundant, offtopic, ...

[DrugCheese]

Has Microsoft really contributed ANY innovation to the computer industry? There's nothing really innovative about aqcuiring another company and assimilating their product into your product line.

Anyone know of an updated site like this? Microsoft Hall of Innovation

Nope.

[PeanutGallery]

"M$ would be stupid to fiddle with any code."
First off, I'm not disagreeing with that. I'm just saying they will ;)
Of course, first they will rewrite the thing in Vb. (Still gotta beat that dead horse.)
Then they need to add:

BEGIN
IF(SpywareDetected)
AND(Url<>"www.microsoft.com")
Call BlockSpyware(Url)
END

(That's about as much Vb as I can stand-even in jest!)
Oh yeah, and for the grand finale they'll rename it "SpywareBlaster.NET", which is technically not copywright infringement.

Typical Microsoft

[Anonymous Coward]

Notice from the comments from those who have browsed the screenshots.

Apparently MS has "removed" some functionality that existed in the orginal product.

I can only imagine that MS is also going to use their update engine via IE for updating the anti-spyware data files, which again puts a user in a vulnerable position.

No, I don't trust Microsoft at all. They are the ones with nothing to lose.

It'd probably be pretty easy to make...

[hGMFliP]

Think about how easy it'd be... I can see the installation wizard now...

"You are about to uninstall Internet Explorer. Are you sure you want to do this?"

"You are about to disconnect from the Internet. Are you sure you want to do this?"

"You are about to uninstall Windows and install ^insert your favorite *N*X here^. Are you sure you want to do this?"

Ahhhh... a guy can dream, can't he?

Re:An MS Linux distribution?

[emilymildew]

That could not have been less of an answer to my question. I asked how it was possible that you cared so much about appearance that you gave up OS X for Win2K.

Does appearance matter, or is it just the illusion of consistency in appearance?

Not free!

[shokk]

For anyone looking to outfit a company with spyware, enterprise remote managed solutions are the only choice. Spybot and Ad-Aware do *not* fit the bill. The question is how Giant's software is managed (through AD?) and monitored compared to management for Webroot SpySweeper or CA Counterspy.

I don't think they can

[bluGill]

IIRC when Microsoft sold XENIX to SCO (1982?) part of the deal what that Microsoft would not enter the Unix market again.

Re:How long until the EU considers this a monopoly

[ad0gg]

Your car gets stolen, you have to buy a new one. I know the dealers profit a lot from stolen cars, by selling LoJack and even preinstalling it in some cases. Insurance companies profit by selling you comprehensive insurace to cover your car if its stolen.

Two Words: Prove It!

[ksemlerK]

"MS already has Office running under Linux, but refuses to market it."

Do you have any conclusive proof that MS has compiled a version specifically for Linux, and not Darwin PPC, or are you just speaking out of your ass, (like most l33t h4x0rZ on slashdot)?

A paradox.

[zwilliams07]

By Microsoft's standards: The Spyware tool removes everything but Windows and IE. By our standars: The Spyware tool removes Windows upon installation, wipes IE with a few passes, and installs a copy of Linux.

Just another System Tools button for the Novice...

[Rudifer_Rex]

On average every corporately released 'anti'-ware, codec, or encryption tools are cracked within 24 hours of their release. Last year in Poland a 13 year old was arrested for cracking a new DVD encryption within 8 hours of its first sale. This is possible due to the simple fact that the same caliber of people writing the security software makes a living from cracking it. This applies to most smaller pieces of 'Anti-Whatever' code on the market - let alone Windows. Windows is the biggest software target in the world. All this piece of sh.... er software will do is eat RAM and convince our parents that MS made the internet safe once again. Its amazing what a new icon in the lower right hand corner does for for some people: "Look its blinking, that means our computer is safe!" Then again I'm not out there programming any 'anti-spyware' tools - so I guess something is better than nothing. At the very least it will kill all the standard spy-ware out there - and thats not bad.

Best sig of the week !

[JackHolloway]

Damn near had to get a new monitor :)

now to refill the coffee mug.

Actually ....

[gstoddart]

How is IE a moving target at the moment? If IE stood still much more than it already is the apes will start to worship it as a monolith.

It's stood still so long that the apes have started to out-evolve it -- they're long since past the point of worshipping it.

Re:can't remove "69.20.16.183 ieautosearch" from h

[Nebu]

There is a new extreme piece of spyware which seems to have surfaced in the last month. [...] some of the things that it does include generating randomly named dll's restarting processes that have been killed, runs IE even in safe mode, drags in a whole raft of other spyware to confuse things and leaves the PC it infects after unsuccessful removal unable to connect to the internet

What is the point of writing a spyware program that causes its host unable to connect to the Internet? That sounds more like a virus than Spyware to me.

Re:REMOVE PARENTS POST IT'S RATED R

[drinkypoo]

That's because there is nowhere to report a post, since it is assumed that our mommies and daddies have already raised us to a point sufficient to simply skip over things we don't want to read.

Re:An MS Linux distribution?

[mickyflynn]

it's mostly the illusion of consistancy. I have nothing against Motif. I have nothing against CDE, really. And its not just a consistancy in form, but also in function. This is a problem often stated on Slashdot with reguards to "linux" applications. They don't all work alike. There are like, 50 different toolkits that can be used and they don't integrate in appearance. The themes don't always work. et cetera. I try to use only GTK apps on my unix installations. I rarely use a theme because i can never find a GTK theme that actually looks like it should be touching the window borders. UNIX is also too customizable. If I bring up an installation of Linux or BSD, i'm unproductive for two days while I try to make it work the way I want it to. If I sit down at someone else's workstation, there could be an infinite possibility of shell configurations. Everyone sticks things in different places, different prompts, alias, clobers, et cetera. It's hell going from one machine to another. With Windows, without paying for something retarded like Window Blinds, I can change some colours and the background image, but that's it. For all intents and purposes, with the exception of installed applications, all Windows machines are alike. I can sit at my friend's computer and use it without issue. The uniformity makes administration and adaptation easier. This is one reason, which I am sure many slashdotters will agree to, that keeps Linux from widspread adoption. Also, it's more 'serious' looking. I can make my desktop look like anything I want to with Enlightenment. OS X looks like a faggy candy store. Windows (with the exception of the ass-ugly XP borders and buttons) does not look like a cartoon. The icons don't look like some kid drew them with a crayon. It says "use me for work" not "gee wiz, look what i can do" or "hey! i'm a peter puffer!" Honestly, going through my teenage years militantly anti-microsoft and not even thinking there was another way to do operating systems other than the UNIX, exchanging emails with Thompson and Ritchie and using C like a rabbid fanboy, I'm the last person I'd expect to say anything in the defense of Windows. But i've grown up. I don't really give a shit anymore. I don't want things getting in my way. I have never had a problem with win2k pro. I don't expect it to do anything amazing, so i dont try and thus i never break it. I'm not a retard so i dont get viruses or spyware. In short, yes, my complaint is about consistancy, not "looks." If I wanted it to look cool, I'd use Linux with Enlightenment. But I just want to do work and get the fuck out of college and join the marines. I don't have time to worry about dotfiles and permissions, or to keep tinkering with the looks of the windows and buttons. I don't want it to look like a lollypop or candyland, or LCARS. But a simple desktop over a BSD core, like this thread started, would be grand. I bet it would have mass adoption. It'd be like OS X on PC hardware and without looking like a homo pride parade.

OT:Re:Sample

[pipingguy]

Just wondering, is that your real name?

Thanks,

Hugh Jass

Re:can't remove "69.20.16.183 ieautosearch" from h

[blackest_k]

I think there is a fine line between what is a virus and what is spyware.
have you ever been in task manager and tried killing a process thats being guarded by another process you can only kill one at a time and which ever one you kill first gets brought back just in time to restore the 2nd one as you try to kill it. safe mode normally stops that game but now you have files which rename themselves before a reboot!

The Spyware doesn't stop you going onto the internet untill you try to remove it.

what are you going to do if you find that attempting to remove spyware kills your net connection and you have to reinstall windows. which also means because of the registry you need to reinstall all your applications get all the updates again search for all your documents, templates, export all your email and address book

lot of work isnt it? or you can put up with the high jacking and random adverts and diverts, and data mining.

maybe the best defense is to use ghost and maintain a clean image of your c drive and have the disipline to store all user files on d: so a simple restore of the ghost image undoes the damage. still email is going to be a problem with outlook and outlook express unless you have an email program which stores your email and addresses outside of the c drive so when you restore your mail is still accessable your still going to have some pain.

spybot search and destroys teatimer is useful in that you should know when somethings playing with your system settings but most of the time you are hoping its the program you are using that is causing the change and not something malicious.

thing is like many of us i have tried to educate the people I support to run adaware and spybot S&D regularly. what situation does it put them in when they do this and lose their net connection?

it's a nightmare and its coming to a pc near you.

Why not stop Spyware before it gets to the PC?

[zerospamnet]

How many CPU cycles will this new product use while doing an incomplete job (since it can only use so many cycles)? Why must the PC always be used as the last (only) line of defense? [Answer: it's the one place Microsoft makes money on every user] There are solutions that can PREVENT ALL THE SPYWARE far ahead of the enterprise/ISP's firewall [and the end user's PC].

For example, 0Spam.Net has successfully blocked all spyware installed by references in email content for the last 18 months. Similarly, 0Proxy.Net has been equally successful against web delivered spyware since 9/1/2004 when it debuted. All this with an audited error rate of less than 1 in 500,000 false positives.

Start thinking a little outside the box folks! With so many people in the computer industry, several people have got have this right. And the chances that it's not Microsoft are statistically the most likely.

-Bill Franklin, President, 0Spam.Net
Zero Spam Network Corporation
1550 Madruga Ave, Ste 405
Coral Gables FL 33146
Phone: 305-666-0373
Email: bill@0spam.net

"Imagine a world with: No Spam, Viruses, ID Theft or Spyware - Guaranteed - http://0spam.net"

Re:can't remove "69.20.16.183 ieautosearch" from h

[Nebu]

While most of what you say is true, there exists a definition for the term "virus" and a definition for the term "spyware", and what you described sounds more like a virus than spyware. That's all I'm trying to say. I didn't mean to imply that it wasn't a lot of work trying to remove viruses or anything like that.

Windows Mobile 2005

[Anonymous Coward]

Sneek Peek!

http://davesipaq.com/news/004364/windows_mobile_ 20 05_revealed

Spyware through Java

[Aliencow]

Yesterday, I was looking for a way to change a serial on Windows 2003 Server, and ended up on some crack sites. One of them launched a Java applet, which launched Internet Explorer, which spawned a bunch of popups, and then bam, I had a stupid toolbar in IE and 2-3 weird processes running. Took a while to clean..

That was browsing with Firefox, with the latest Java 2 and Windows XP Service pack 2 with all the current fixes for Internet Explorer, security settings at HIGH for internet zone...

Re:A few things:

[Anonymous Coward]

And I just MetaModded your 'flamebait' as fair... not that it matters to an AC though.

</food>

VNC? Huh?

[Roguelazer]

This detects TightVNC as "Remote Control Spyware". Huh. Interesting piece of software they made.