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Spyware
You visit your favorite music web site...and
it's instantly reported back to a central server. You then check the news
on cnn.com...and it's instantly reported to a central server. Then you
check the soccer schedule on the tempe.gov site and, you guessed it, it's
instantly reported back to a central server. We are talking about a form
of 'big brother' that is so simple and yet far more invasive than we could have
ever imagined a few years ago. And here's the good part. You
probably approved the process!!
Spyware is thought to be the fastest growing
problem on the Internet...even nudging aside the spam and virus problems.
A recent study was conducted by Earthlink using one million of their customers
to see how many had spyware running on their machines. 300,000 did!
And most of them had no clue they did.
Tempe had a problem with spyware at one time.
Someone found a really cool program that helped them remember passwords to sites
and kept track of their favorite places to surf and a host of other 'free'
features. Of course they told their work mates about it and in a matter of
a couple days it was running on dozens of machines. The staff in charge of
our network noticed a sharp increase in traffic going to the internet and after
checking it out found that, as these people used the Internet, every single place
they went was being reported back to a central server. It almost doubled
the traffic on our network. So, you can imagine why Earthlink and every
other ISP would like spyware to stop and has targeted it as a serious problem.
Spyware is not considered a virus. When
you found it and loaded it you probably agreed to that really long user
agreement. Who ever reads all that small print anyhow? Well, you
should have. In it you agreed that in exchange for their 'free' service
you gave them your 'okay' to send them your surfing destinations and basically
your behavior on the web. Some can even check what software you have
loaded on your computer and report it back.
So, the big question is, what do they do with
that information?
Some spyware will simply sort your behavior
into topics. For example, if you enjoy fishing and have visited a lot of
fishing sites you might notice an increase in spam trying to sell
you a new kind of fishing pole. The spyware company sold your email
address as a fishing enthusiast.
Other spyware programs will load ads into
your computer and then pop them up. The way you know you have one of these
is when you get popup ads and your not even on line! Some of these will
wait for a good match. For example, you go to target.com and a popup ad
appears for pennys.com. Or you go to acehardware.com and get a popup from
sears.com. This is target marketing.
As side note, don't be upset with the
companies advertised in the popups. Many pay agencies to do some of their
marketing and those agencies then subcontract to others, etc. and somewhere
along the line their ad ends up as a popup on your computer even though they
would have never approved that form of advertising from the start.
So, how do I make sure I don't have spyware?
There are probably several programs that
check for it out there. One we've used at the City that seems to do well
is Adaware by lavasoft.com. Just use the word 'spyware' and do a Google
search to find some products to select from. We are not endorsing them in
any way but giving you a place to start your research. A program like this
can be set to monitor any new programs that are installed on your computer.
It'll warn you but allow you to accept programs when you know what is being
loaded, like that new game you just bought. But, you might be surprised at
how often things might be loaded on your computer that you are not aware of.
A good spyware detector can help you keep your machine clean.
For more information on spyware check these
sites:
http://grc.com/optout.htm
http://www.spychecker.com/spyware.html
http://us.mcafee.com/
http://www.symantec.com
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