Chris Scott

Yesterday I spent some time restoring my mom’s Dell Dimension 3000 PC. Internet explorer had 5 toolbars, It was getting random pop-ups and it was running extremely slow; all classic symptoms of spyware. The great thing about any Dell PC that was build sometime within the last 3 years, is its built-in recovery feature. That means no recovery disks! This is what came in place of them:

A piece of the hard drive is partitioned as an image of the software that was installed just after leaving the factory. All you have to do is press CTRL F11, and you are brought right the recovery menu, where you can choose to restore your PC to original factory settings; a process that only takes about 5 minutes. The one disadvantage of restoring your PC in this way is that you loose any data you had previously stored on your PC. Because of this, I backed up all the pictures and stuff that my mother wanted to save with a 4GB thumb drive.

Of course I would never have had to do all that if spyware had not infected it in the first place. It seems that many computers I come across that are not mine are noticeably infected with some form of malicious software. Most people I come across who have this sort of problem also seem relatively uninformed as to the nature of spyware and other forms of malicious software.

In my experience, the best way to combat malicious software is to take prevention measures. Many times when a computer is infected, it is hopeless to completely remove all traces of the infection. Modern malicious software is like a virus that keeps spreading, it has the capability of self-extracting itself into sub-directories, and folders that you didn’t even know existed! Yes, there are antidotes, but finding the right antidotes is a task in an of itself. You have to consider which anti-spyware programs to buy (or download freely), you have to update the definitions constantly, you have to choose the correct scan type and appropriate what to do with bugs that are detected. Removing spyware is a science in an of itself. Which is why I plead with people to understand the basics of spyware, so that they can prevent infections and create less work for people (like myself) who always have to clean up the mess afterwards!

Below is a list of 3 things many people don’t know about malware. If you are a regular customer of the ‘geek squad’ or if your computer takes over 10 minutes to start up, then I strongly recommend you read on.

1. Malware is 90% of the time contracted from websites that you visit. Be careful about what sites you visit, especially when you discover them by using search engines. Malicious software makes its way to your computer as a result of you clicking something you shouldn’t have. The other 10% of infections come from programs you install that you think are legitimate, but really release malicious software directly into your system. Sometimes the installer will even asking you to install the software under a blanket identity. What I mean by a ‘blanket identity,’ is a type of software that somewhat appeals to the user; meaning it may appear to add functionality to your computer. An example of this would be the “Web Search Toolbar.” This toolbar actually serves ads to your computer under the identity of a browser toolbar. Be wary of installing any toolbars that have non-reputable brands.

2. The same people who create spyware are often times the same people who create anti-spyware! There is an enormous amount of money to be made in freeing people from spyware; do a search on Google and see how many products come up for ‘anti-spyware.’ One computer I was attempting to purge actually had continual pop-up ads for expensive anti-spyware software! This indicates that the infections were most likely placed by the anti-spyware manufacturers themselves! Brilliant, but unethical marketing in my opinion. Be careful about where you purchase (or download freely) your anti-spyware software; use reputable brands like Micrsoft, LavaSoft, Norton and McAfee. Don’t feed the mouth that bites you! (I know, I reversed it!)

3. True malware is extremely difficult to eradicate entirely. Cleansing a deeply infected PC is like cleansing dirt particles from muddy water. Some malware actually alters the windows registry and procreates from links in your registry. If you delete portions of the registry, you risk destroying your system or creating more holes for the malware to seep through. Malware can even re-write those links after deletion and a system restart! Save yourself some time and wipe the whole darn thing clean. Most computers now days have a built in recovery partition or you could use recovery disks.

By the way, if you were wondering the difference between “Malware,” “Spyware,” and “Adware,” let me explain. Malware is a general term which applies to all malicious software. Spyware, although many times used interchangibly with malware (it’s a fun word I guess), refers to malicious software which ‘spies’ on your computer, and collects private information or data. Adaware refers to malicious software that specifically serves ads to your computer (typically in the form of pop-ups). All things we want to avoid!

Well, I hope these info-tips have been helpful to someone. I wish you the very best!