Dealing with malware on your computer by John Becker The Bugle February 19, 2014 Stay away from anything offering "free" stuff on the Internet, unless you know for certain the company or website is legitimate. Malware is defined as programs that "hide" within another program, and will do things that you may not want or never intended. Example: there is a website with a "Weather APP" that claims to give you free live temperature and forecasts. Sounds good, right? Well, no. If you agree to install the "Weather App", a whole bunch of other software rides in on the "weather app" coattails, as it were. Next thing you know, you have four new icons on your desktop in addition to the "Weather App": "RegClean Pro", "Search Protector", "MyBackup", and "iLivid movie player." When you go to search for something, you'll notice your home page looks a bit odd, and the search results look odd too. What they did not tell you is that to accept the "Weather App" you also agreed to the four other programs, plus changing your default home page to their search engine. And they also did not tell you that they will pop-up constant "nag screens" to try and get you buy their junk software. This is all brought to you by "www.conduit.com" (do not visit this page). Conduit.com specializes in doing these types of shenanigans, too bad it is not illegal to do so. Their defense is that "the user clicked OK before reading the fine print." Why didn't my Anti-Virus catch this? Well, malware is not destructive, so it is not interpreted as a virus per se. And, since you (or whomever was using your computer) clicked "OK" to install it, your anti-virus assumes it is OK and leaves it alone. That's when the fun begins; all the rest of the unwanted software rides right in with your "free" app, and soon you have a junked up computer with all kinds of "nag" pop-ups. What can I do to Avoid Malware? My Recommendation: stay away from anything offering "free" stuff on the Internet, unless you know for certain the company or website offering the free stuff is legitimate. Likewise, any form of media, video, music or game site that requires you to download and install their "player app" is also highly suspect. What can I do to get rid of Malware? Most malware is easily removable, and I recommend the excellent (and free) www.malwarebytes.com as a good malware remover. Wait a minute, you say you just advised me not to download free stuff. Yes I did, but Malwarebytes is a legitimate company, so you have my official blessing to do so. Installation is easy, be aware the third step will present three checkboxes - un-check the top box for "Start Free Trial" and then continue the install. You'll have to manually do updates and start the scan process, but as a free app, this is great. If you prefer to make the process automatic, the official paid version of Malwarebytes is $35 per year, a bargain. ********************************** Junkware Websites by JOHN BECKER The Bugle May 21, 2014 Stuff to stay away from on the web * MindSpark.com - If there ever was a company I wish would just go away, these guys would be on the top of my list. MindSpark's special talent is buying up bankrupt web companies with familiar names and converting them to their junkware and malware distribution scheme. Remember the "Excite" web service? How about Ask.com or Askjeeves search engines? Or the MyWay search engine? They all were at one time legitimate companies, but they went under. Most egregious example: www.bibletriviatime.com (don't go there), a bible quotation and bible trivia site. It still is bible trivia, but to use it you are required to download their "app" to play. When you do, a whole bunch of junk software and popups ride in along with it, and it also installs the Ask toolbar. Note that this all happens without your permission, unless you read the fine print. The Ask toolbar interposes itself between you and any other search engine and re-directs your searches to MindSpark advertisers, or to even more junk software sites. If you try to go back to Google, the redirect still operates, and you will not get a Google result - you get a MindSpark result. Here is a link to a list of their websites. You can look, but don't click any icons or install anything. MindSpark: www.mindspark.com/featured_products.php * Conduit.com - Like MindSpark.com, this is a smaller but no less annoying web operator. Molded in the same vein as MindSpark, these clowns also are in the business of buying up bankrupt or abandoned web sites, and re-forming them into their spyware/junkware/Trojan horse software and ad pop-up distribution scheme. When you hit one of their sites, you are badgered with pop-ups that proclaim all sorts of problems on your PC, or free weather apps, or whatever. All junk. Conduit is perhaps a bit more direct in their approach if you unfortunately become infected. They have no qualms about removing your entire websearch settings, replacing everything including toolbars and your home page with their junk software and their homepage. It's almost as if they want to get in your face and taunt you about how they have taken over. Fortunately, it is not destructive like a virus, but no less aggravating to remove. As you may have guessed by now, these "Free" sites have one thing in common: "Free" is not really free; both come with some pretty annoying and intrusive strings attached. I recommend you steer clear of these sites and others like them. Read this and many more articles on my website: www.medofficsystems.com