[JA] Report on spyware from the Langalist
- From: "Brian L. Johnson" <blj8@xxxxxxxx>
- To: Juno_accmail <juno_accmail@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Thu, 12 Jul 2001 04:05:43 -0600 (MDT)
Seems that Juno and Netzero may be including spyware in their
distributions?
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Fred Langa <fred@xxxxxxxxx>
9) "Foistware Nasties"
Foistware is a new term for software that surreptitiously adds hidden
components to your system--- foisting them on you, on the sly. The term
is used to differentiate the kind of sneak-installation done by
commercial apps from classic Trojan horse apps, which are usually
hacker/cracker products.
Reader John Alvey was the first I'd heard use that term in this note
about some "foistware nasties:"
Fred, In the light of your recent discussions of both spyware
and Ad-Aware, I want to tell you about my horrific
experiences. There are two new nasties around (which some are
calling foistware) called Webhancer and NewDotNet. Not only do
they put nasty spyware on your PC if you try to remove it by
simply deleting it, your winsock will get trashed and you
won't be able to get to the Internet at all. Ad-Aware claims
it safely removes these programs but I can assure you that the
latest version might safely remove Webhancer but it does not
safely remove NewDotNet.
Indeed, when I used As-Aware to remove NewDotNet, I was unable
to reconnect to the Internet and even reinstalling Windows did
not get me back (I ended up having to uninstall and reinstall
Windows). If you do find either on your system, you should
uninstall Webhancer using the standard Add/Remove Software
feature in Control Panel.. NewDotNet claims the same method
will work but others have had problems and alternative methods
are offered in the resources below.
NewDotNet seems to come with Earthlink,, @Home, Juno, Webshots
and NetZero; Webhancer comes with AudioGalaxy and Bearshare
(both post-Napster P2P programs).
Resources:
Webhancer - http://www.cexx.org/webhancer.htm ;
http://webhancer.com/support/index.asp?s=32&p=install
NewDotNet - http://www.cexx.org/newnet.htm ;
http://www.new.net/help_faq.tp#p4
Thanks, John!
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~*~
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