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Off-Topic Discussion => General Discussion => Topic started by: WMCoolmon on June 30, 2008, 01:24:28 am

Title: After 18 months with no spyware protection...
Post by: WMCoolmon on June 30, 2008, 01:24:28 am
(http://wmc.freespacemods.net/misc/spyware.gif)

Thunderbird, Firefox+NoScript, good firewall protection and careful choice in installed applications is apparently really good for a computer.
Title: Re: After 18 months with no spyware protection...
Post by: Vasudan Admiral on June 30, 2008, 02:22:26 am
Well after approximately 12 months using IE7, AntiVir, no firewall and not terribly careful application installation, I get exactly two tracking cookies under the most up to date spybot, having not run it or anything else since I first installed it back then.

As such, I've never really understood the browser wars. ;)
Title: Re: After 18 months with no spyware protection...
Post by: Jeff Vader on June 30, 2008, 02:43:46 am
As such, I've never really understood the browser wars. ;)
Dunno about wars, but an inconvenient truth is that whenever a new and useful feaure is presented in a web browser, it appears on IE roughly 3-4 years later. And to be honest, I can no longer view any sites with IE without crying. The ads, they're everywhere. They must be stopped.

As a side note, a combination of Comodo Firewall and avast! Home Edition. Works like a charm.
Title: Re: After 18 months with no spyware protection...
Post by: Nuclear1 on June 30, 2008, 02:47:40 am
Bah, I run registry checks and two different virus scans every Sunday.  As a result I'm always 100% clean.
Title: Re: After 18 months with no spyware protection...
Post by: achtung on June 30, 2008, 03:59:45 am
I use Linux.

Can I get a prize or something now?
Title: Re: After 18 months with no spyware protection...
Post by: karajorma on June 30, 2008, 05:28:17 am
No.

Since you run Linux you must compile your own prize. :p
Title: Re: After 18 months with no spyware protection...
Post by: Ghostavo on June 30, 2008, 06:07:41 am
Well, there must be one in his distributions repository...
Title: Re: After 18 months with no spyware protection...
Post by: WMCoolmon on June 30, 2008, 06:51:45 am
Well, there must be one in his distributions repository...

There is, but it's missing one of the dependencies.
Title: Re: After 18 months with no spyware protection...
Post by: nubbles526 on June 30, 2008, 09:26:22 am
Ummm...WMCoolmen, experts always tell the public that one anti-spyware program couldn't catch everything. Make sure you run another one....just to make sure.
Title: Re: After 18 months with no spyware protection...
Post by: colecampbell666 on June 30, 2008, 09:42:17 am
:rolleyes:
Title: Re: After 18 months with no spyware protection...
Post by: Mr. Vega on June 30, 2008, 04:20:47 pm
Yeah, I don't particularly trust Spybot these days, as much as I used to like it. I'd recommend scanning with SUPERAntiSpyware before you start bragging.
Title: Re: After 18 months with no spyware protection...
Post by: FUBAR-BDHR on June 30, 2008, 04:42:50 pm
I try to do full maintenance and scanning about every 3 months.  Start with an image of the machine just in case followed by all patches.  Then full antivrus sweep, 2 different spyware checkers, and finally hijackthis just to be sure.  In the past 10 years I've gotten 1 virus and that was from an email with an .exe disguised as a .fs2 file attachment that turned out to be one of those send junk and the virus to everyone in your address book things.  I don't use an address book so no real problem on my end it just took about 2 hours to find the patch and clean it.   Would have never opened it without scanning it first if I could have read it but it was from one of the Drunks and in German so I figured he just forgot to translate it.   Never ran a resident anti virus program until about a year or so ago.  I usually end up with the same short list of tracking cookies.  Been using Netscape/Mozilla/Firefox since I started using windows.  Scan all files I download before I open them and after if it's a compressed file. 
Title: Re: After 18 months with no spyware protection...
Post by: Snail on June 30, 2008, 04:44:43 pm
Ummm...WMCoolmen, experts always tell the public that one anti-spyware program couldn't catch everything. Make sure you run another one....just to make sure.
You know quite a few of those anti-spyware programs are actually spyware themselves.
Title: Re: After 18 months with no spyware protection...
Post by: WMCoolmon on July 01, 2008, 12:09:02 am
Yeah, I took a look at Adaware and was rather put off by all the commercialism, ads, and cookies I had to sort through in order to get to the download link.

SUPERAntiSpyware...what kind of a name is that? :wtf: That alone makes me suspicious. It's also not in wikipedia, never a good sign, I prefer something that enough people have used that some power-users have gone over it with a critical eye and made sure it isn't doing something itself.
Title: Re: After 18 months with no spyware protection...
Post by: jr2 on July 01, 2008, 03:37:54 am
AVG 8.0 free has anti-spyware built in.  ;)
Title: Re: After 18 months with no spyware protection...
Post by: nubbles526 on July 01, 2008, 07:13:32 am
Yeah, I took a look at Adaware and was rather put off by all the commercialism, ads, and cookies I had to sort through in order to get to the download link.

SUPERAntiSpyware...what kind of a name is that? :wtf: That alone makes me suspicious. It's also not in wikipedia, never a good sign, I prefer something that enough people have used that some power-users have gone over it with a critical eye and made sure it isn't doing something itself.

You can't trust anbody these days  :rolleyes:

Try this:
http://www.hitmanpro.nl/hitmanpro/index.php?lang=en

It's a compilation of anti-spyware programs - which most of them are free.
Title: Re: After 18 months with no spyware protection...
Post by: TopAce on July 01, 2008, 07:28:02 am
AVG 8.0 free has anti-spyware built in.  ;)

I wonder how effective that is. AVG is primarily an anti-virus program, so even if it has such a feature, the creators spent less time with it. If I used any anti-spyware, I would use a program that does only that.

Besides, I also think being careful in what I download is the best way to keep my comp safe.
Title: Re: After 18 months with no spyware protection...
Post by: NGTM-1R on July 01, 2008, 09:06:27 am
I wonder how effective that is. AVG is primarily an anti-virus program, so even if it has such a feature, the creators spent less time with it. If I used any anti-spyware, I would use a program that does only that.

Pretty effective, considering that spyware and virii do similar things. Most serious antivirus programs these days include spyware protection as a matter of course.
Title: Re: After 18 months with no spyware protection...
Post by: Polpolion on July 02, 2008, 10:24:51 am
I've had no spyware protection either for about the same time length. No spyware at all. Of course, having a busted internet helps.
Title: Re: After 18 months with no spyware protection...
Post by: Nemesis6 on July 02, 2008, 11:32:37 am
I trust firefox, too. But just in case, I'm running NOD32, and Threatfire. Threatfire is a kind of heuristics program. For example, if an executable does something suspect, like copying itself to multiple places, tries to inject code into other applications, etc, I will be told about it, and given the choice to deny, accept, etc. It has 5 levels that you can use, 5 being paranoid, 3 being default. It doesn't question **** around with every exe you run, because normal exe files won't exhibit these traits that it scans for. It takes virtually no memory, and it can scan for rootkits, too. A nice addition to a dedicated anti virus program.
Title: Re: After 18 months with no spyware protection...
Post by: jr2 on July 07, 2008, 07:20:42 am
AVG 8.0 free has anti-spyware built in.  ;)

I wonder how effective that is. AVG is primarily an anti-virus program, so even if it has such a feature, the creators spent less time with it. If I used any anti-spyware, I would use a program that does only that.

Besides, I also think being careful in what I download is the best way to keep my comp safe.

Grisoft had two products: AVG Free Edition 7.5 and AVG Anti-Spyware 7.5 Free Edition.  They are now merged with the 8.0 release.  ;)  (I used to run both on my machine.)  BTW, you should know that it's pretty hard to find AVG Free Edition on their site... helps to know the direct link, http://free.grisoft.com .  :D