eWeek: We Must Beat Spyware
Spyware is driving me crazy. I thought I was pretty safe and clean until I tried PestPatrol's online spyware checker. Yikes! I don't think I was loaded by any standard, but because I had been running AdAware and SpyBot I figured I was cool. Nope. They might be good, but they don't catch everything. Not by a long-shot. I read a post that Dell was giving away a 10-day eval version of PestPatrol. I downloaded, scanned, and cleaned. Great. Done. Yesterday, feeling smug and a tad bit paranoid, I went back to PestPatrol to scan again. More! This time there were two keyloggers too! Full panic mode. Then I started digging through my directories and registry, I couldn't find a trace of the spyware listed. False alarm I think. I read on a post by Chris Pirillo that he was a) recommending OS X to people and b) that Yahoo's toolbar with built-in spyware cleaner was good. I usually use FireFox, but launched IE to get the toolbar. I ran the spy-checker and it cleaned out one of the listed baddies, but it didn't list the other two. Again, I think false alarm from the online checker. Whew. I'm clean, again, I hope.
We are losing control of our (Windows-based) computers. Viruses were bad enough. Now malware. It seems that every time you turn around you need to spend $40 to by another program to keep you safe from online problems. Sometimes I seriously think about switching to Linux on my laptop, but I have too much invested in my Windows applications. Next time around, Linux or OS X (or whatever Apple is offering then) are high on my list. I respect that advertisers have to make a buck. I don't respect people trying to steal information. That's criminal. I don't know if there is something that can be done at the OS level to render these things useless, but it would be helpful. I also realize that switching to another OS might only stave off the problem until later, when malware writers focus on Linux and OS X. Something has to be done. I'm not sure that passing laws will do it, but we have to have a solution soon or I think all of our privacy and security is going to be put at risk. Think about if a virus/malware combo was use by a terrorist group? Not a pleasant thought.
As a major threat to the effective functioning of the Internet, spyware must be confronted by both industry and the government.