Did you install a Windows patch Tuesday? Listen, and understand. That
mystery update is in there. It can't be uninstalled. It can't be reasoned with. It doesn't feel pity, or remorse, or fear. And it absolutely will not stop, ever, until you are assimilated.
posted by pjern
on Jun 9, 2010 -
55 comments
UAE phone company pushes BlackBerry update with embedded spyware. The United Arab Emirates phone company
Etisalat recently sent out a firmware update to its BlackBerry-using customers, billed as a “performance enhancement patch”. After customers reported the patch degrading their handsets' performance and draining their batteries more rapidly, a programmer examined it and found that it contained spyware from
a US company, which could be remotely activated to forward all emails and text messages to a third-party server.
[more inside]
posted by acb
on Jul 15, 2009 -
31 comments
Online communities to become more 'all-encompassing.' If you join the SHC community on Sears.com, all web traffic to and from your computer thereafter will be copied and sent to a third party marketing research firm - including, for example, your secure sessions with your bank! The Sears.com proxy will send your logins and passwords along with a cleartext copy of all the supposedly secure data.
But wait, it gets better: you can only view the true TOS once the proxy has already been installed.
[more inside]
posted by ikkyu2
on Jan 3, 2008 -
70 comments
Google turning to the dark side? From the article:
In short, Google and Dell have teamed up to install some software on Dell computers that borders on being spyware. I say spyware because it’s hard to figure out what it is and is even harder to remove. It also breaks all kinds of OpenDNS functionality. At the end, I’ll tell you what we’re doing about it.
posted by psmealey
on May 23, 2007 -
104 comments
"To tell the truth ... I'm sorta surprised they haven't caught me yet," The Washington Post ran an interesting interview with a botmaster, a young man who made serveral thousands of dollars a month installing XXX spyware on machines that he controlled. He installed the software on the machines of people he did not know by hacking into them remotely. The lenghty article included a partial photo of the botmaster along with vauge descriptions of the small midwestern town where the man lives, and was published with the understanding that the man's identity would be kept secret.
Someone should have told that to the person that manages photos at the Washington Post. An estute reader over at
Slashdot was able to locate some extra information stored in the picture's metadata including the photographer and the location the picture was taken, Roland, Oklahoma, a town of less than 3000 people. Whoops.
posted by daHIFI
on Feb 21, 2006 -
56 comments
Dale Begg-Smith is being called the "
golden boy of the slopes" by the Australian media after winning gold in the Turin Winter Games. However, when asked about his business, which has reportedly earned him millions of dollars and enabled him to buy a Lamborghini, Begg-Smith became "..vague about its nature." "It's complicated," he said. "We make the technology for companies to monitor their online advertising campaigns."
What is emerging now is that Begg-Smith's companies, AdsCPM and CPM Media, are
linked to home page hijacking, spyware, porn redirectors, and other unsavory internet practices.
A quick
WHOIS of AdsCPM.com reveals that the same IP address is shared with porn domain names and websites that are notorious for distributing spyware.
Bloggers using the Wayback machine have turned up similar information. Is he a willing spyware merchant who has now reluctantly been
bought to our attention, or a legitimate internet entrepreneur?
posted by davem
on Feb 17, 2006 -
39 comments
RealOne without the spyware The BBC, being a public service broadcaster, are forbidden from advertising. However, their internet streams are in Real format - the player of which is not known for being ad-free. The BBC have done a deal with Real to provide a "clean" version of RealOne (Windows only) - only available from the above link.
posted by Mwongozi
on Feb 2, 2004 -
31 comments
Hooray! Great news for those who love to communicate - Microsoft have released a new version of their popular Windows/MSN/.NET
Messenger software! So, let's glance at the new features: there's a great new look with a
spinny logo thingy, and... and, erm... well... it's had some features
removed... like the ability to use third-party add-ons... and, oh but wait, there's new
pop-up advertising and alleged spy-ware! Oh...
posted by Pretty_Generic
on Nov 26, 2002 -
20 comments
If Earthlink starts killing pop-up ads will a trend emerge? I hate pop-up ads, but they must have some effect because I see more and more. I can see the logic in Earthlink's attempt to gain customers by promising to block pop-up ads, but will it have an effect? I can get other pop-up killers without getting it from
Earthlink. Why don't they address
spyware and attack web advertisers where they live?
posted by john_lustig
on Aug 20, 2002 -
27 comments
Comet Cursor not Spyware claim founders. Just Crapware! "The information we were logging was completely useless, except for charging sites for cursor impressions," said Rosen, who pointed out in Lavasoft's forums that Comet Systems is a company of programmers, not marketeers.
"You may believe that our software is buggy, in which case you may conclude we're lame, but we're not running a direct marketing business like some of the other malware/adware/spyware companies on your list," Rosen wrote.
posted by srboisvert
on Jun 6, 2002 -
5 comments
Brillian Digital has quietly attached its software to Kazaa and plans to remotely "turn on" people’s PCs, welding them into a new network. CEO sez a pop-up box will give people a chance to turn it off. Users who've accept "terms of service" already distributed with Brilliant’s and Kazaa’s software are already agreeing to let their computers be used without any payment at all.
posted by ao4047
on Apr 2, 2002 -
27 comments
Netscape Phones Home Yet another major software vendor snoops on users. Netscape, the former darling of the anti-Microsoft movement, captures search terms that users enter on third party sites if users have set the search tab in the sidebar to load a site other than Netscape's own search engine and sends information back to Netscape. Can you trust your own system anymore?
posted by srboisvert
on Mar 9, 2002 -
6 comments
The Anatomy of File Download Spyware. A nice report on the "spyware" present in downloading utilities like Netscape/AOL's "Smart Download", NetZip "Download Demon", and RealNetworks "RealDownload". It's true, we are all being watched.
posted by Succa
on Jul 16, 2000 -
1 comment
This is scary as hell. I'd like someone to explain to me how this ("update-dll.exe") is any different than "Back Orifice" or "Backdoor G7"? Aren't these guys violating the law? Where's the FBI when we need them?
posted by Steven Den Beste
on Jun 4, 2000 -
7 comments
The Spyware Infested Software List. All programs on this list surreptitiously report back to a server telling either what you've been doing or what is on your computer. It's quite a list.
I don't understand why Navigator isn't on there, though. Navigator's "What's Related" feature does exactly the same thing.
posted by Steven Den Beste
on May 28, 2000 -
7 comments
