Chapter One
Once upon a time, in a far away land (The Internet), it was so much fun to just surf! Click a link here, click a link there and see where all the clicking took me! Wow, I found so many interesting
things. There were tons of free stuff, too! Lots and lots of pretty wallpapers and screensavers to decorate my Windows 95 computer.
Dial up was getting faster, almost speedy back then. I just loved all that great eye candy! Microsoft introduced a clever program to install something called 'Themes' and there were ever so many
sites that had free themes and I wanted them all!
The only things I really had to worry about were BSODs (Blue Screen Of Death) (and there were a lot of them with Windows 95!) and once in a while a virus would show up, but McAfee always seemed to
catch it in time.
No one had ever heard of anything called 'spyware' or 'malware' and Trojans and worms were few and far between. The spammers and scammers were still beyond the horizon and the Internet was fun!
I learned so much about my computer (I practically lived on Microsoft's site, troubleshooting BSODs and other problems) and I was so proud of myself when I figured out how to fix a problem. There
was no wonderful Google back then either.
One day my computer started acting really strange. My programs started to disappear. The computer was running oh so slow. Then the printer disappeared. Yikes! What was going on?
I booted into DOS and it said my drive was full. Oh, dear, now what? Then my younger son said his computer was acting really strange. When he booted into DOS, his computer showed the drive was
full!
Then it dawned on me, we had two virus-infected computers. McAfee had let us down. So now we had to format and re-install Windows. Again. With Windows 95, format and re-install was a very common
occurrence. I decided McAfee had to go and installed Norton. Norton kept my computer free of virus from then until I decided to try something else because Symantec products got to be such resource
piggish.
I found Yahoo Groups and lurked and lurked, learning all the time. I was afraid to post anything because I was afraid of appearing dumb. Then I noticed something, the folks that were answering the
questions posted by other users were giving the same answers I would have given. So then I got brave and started posting, asking questions and answering others.
Gradually, things started to change. Emails started to come in with files attached, virus! My email scanner always caught them, but why was this happening? Back then I didn't realize there were so
many malcontents who took delight in sending out little code snippets designed to destroy someone else's computer or delete all of their data.
Norton started having updates more than once a month. On dial-up this sometimes took a long time and because system resources were limited, this pretty much took the computer into a 'can't use it
now, wait until the update is finished' mode.
This was pretty aggravating, but little did I or anyone else realize this was pretty tame compared to what was coming down the road.
Chapter Two
The next scourge of the Internet came along, and it's name was/is SPAM!
It came rushing into email inboxes everywhere and some of it was not nice. Really not nice. These aggravating, irritating messages were and are still, trying to sell us everything from illegal
software to porn, drugs to whatever!
We deleted them all everyday to have the same deluge again the next day. This caused us to try all sorts of things to try to stop this onslaught of slime. We learned how to make filters for our
email clients and block senders. We got 'throw-away' email addresses. We tried Spam catcher programs. They helped to delete it, but nothing stopped it from coming. As soon as we blocked one
entrance, they would find another!
For quite a while it seemed like there was virus, virus everywhere! And in a sense, it was everywhere and remains so today. It requires keeping an updated virus scanner running on your computer
all the time.
But that isn't all! Someone really clever (and warped) figured out a way to get into a computer that was connected to the Internet even though it had a virus scanner. And a group of malcontents
known as 'script kiddies' were taking delight in hacking into computers, deleting files and creating general havoc.
So now we had to get a firewall for our computers! This was starting to get expensive for poor folks like me! A virus scanner and now a firewall.
Fortunately there are some enterprising individuals and companies who decided it would be a good idea to offer free versions of their virus scanners and firewalls. After all, if all of the
personal computers got infected with virus or were made un-usable, then there wouldn't be many customers for their software. And if they offered free versions that did the job, then maybe the
people would decide to get a better, perhaps faster and with more options copy of the freeware program and upgrade to a paid version.
Soon most of the folks in user groups or Yahoo Groups started talking about the free programs and for a lot of people looking for help, things got better. For a while, that is.
Chapter Three
I really can't remember the first time I heard the term 'spyware'. At first it didn't seem like much, maybe tracking cookies that would let someone know where all I went on the Internet. I didn't
like it much, but no real danger, or so I thought. Oh, innocent thought! How I wish that were true!
The true facts of spyware are varied. It can be a tracking cookie, a program that causes irritating popup ads, a script to make my homepage change to another site, (where I don't want to go) or it
can be a silent program to let someone know what my passwords are to my banking site so they can clean out my account!
Spyware is the common name for a large number of sneaky and stealthy programs planted on a computer without the owner's consent or knowledge.
It really can be called 'malware'. This covers the whole spectrum of bad stuff, hijackers, keyloggers, a program that will capture every keystroke a user makes (how they can steal my passwords),
Trojans, worms, rootkits that are really hard to find and remove, just a plethora of bad stuff! There is so much of it out there we can't stay ahead of it all.
There are some free programs to eliminate spyware, but the fact of the matter is, no one program will catch and remove it all. We need at least three removers and sometimes more!
The free programs do find and remove most of the spyware, but there are some really nasty things out there that require a commercial spyware remover like Webroot's SpySweeper or CA's PestPatrol
and even then some things can get through. I have found that using Mozilla's Firefox to be the best deterrent, but sooner or later this may not be the case!
Some Definitions
Hijackers: These are the programs that will change your home page to another site, usually a porn site, but not always. Hijackers can be easy or difficult to remove.
Keyloggers: These stealthy programs record every keystroke a user makes and can send the information to the culprit that planted the software. Keyloggers come in many forms and some are even
supposed to be helpful. (Yeah, sure.)
Trojans: This is a program masquerading as something helpful but in reality is probably introducing a virus onto your computer.
Worms: These are similar in nature to a virus and are closely related. Worms can infect computers from a network and do not have to have help from a person to do their dirty work.
Rootkits: Can be a set of programs that can be used to monitor traffic and keystrokes; create a backdoor into the system for the hacker's use; alter log files; attack other machines on the
network; and alter existing system tools to circumvent detection.
Rootkits are an extreme form of System Modification Software. This definition is from The Anti-spyware coalition,
http://www.antispywarecoalition.org/
There are some free programs to eliminate spyware, but the fact of the matter is, no one program will catch and remove it all. We need at least three removers and sometimes more! The free programs
do find and remove most of the spyware, but there are some really nasty things out there that require a full blown super scanner that require programmers full time researching on how to remove the
stuff. So that means commercial products as folks just can't spend all their time working for free, they have to earn a living!