Spyware

Jealous Lover “Lover Spy” spyware author Carlos Enrique Perez-Melara has been arrested and indicted for creating and distributing the “Lover Spy” program, also known as a “jealous lover” program. Lover Spy allowed jealous lovers and others to remotely monitor and read the online communications, such as email, of their targets.

Spyware which redirects a user’s computer to a particular website is not uncommon, and may be quite lucrative. But can lead to jail.
Spyware which redirected users machines to a pornography site, in fact spyware which made user’s main page the pornography site, has lead to the arrest of a man in Korea. […]

If you don’t think that spyware is really a problem, you must either be using a Mac or Unix machine, or not connected to the Internet. WebRoot has just announced that their database of spyware has exceeded 100,000 unique traces of spyware!:
“Combined Efforts of Dedicated In-House Threat Research Team and Phileas Protect Millions Against […]

Sophos reports that 50% of all Windows PCs connected to the Internet are infected within 12 minutes of them being wired to the web. This applies to all Windows PCs that have no serious anti-virus protection and an active firewall.
According to the same company, 7,944 new viruses were released in the first half of 2005, […]

The Federal Trade Commission has announced that it has received a restraining order against and frozen the assets of TrustSoft and their SpyKiller program, a program which, the FTC says, was nothing more than a scam.

If you have been wondering whether RSS has negative implications and drawbacks, this is just about the right time to start seeing these characteristics emerge amidst passionate reactions from developers and users alike.
As a researcher and explorer of new and effective uses of new media technologies, I have been supporting use and adoption of RSS […]

First, the big Internet annoyance was spam. Now it is spyware! Why is
this happening? Simply because there is big money in spyware, benefiting
both legitimate businesses and cybercriminals. Both wage a battle for your
personal information, surfing, and buying habits. There are Internet advertisers
that want to know where you click, and the “Net Mafia” is trying to […]

As if online downloaders don’t have enough to worry about (rightly or wrongly), now they have to worry about spyware being buried within the media files they download.
I don’t think this is what Marshall McLuhan had in mind.
According to a report in InformationWeek, hackers are taking advantage of certain “features” of the Windows Digital […]

You young whippersnappers may think that Scott Richter is the actual Spam King, but he is really only heir apparent to the throne.
The real Spam King is Sanford Wallace, who has been around in one form or another for well over a decade. It was Wallace’s CyberPromotions against which many a spam lawyer first […]

Webroot, the developers of the Spy Sweeper anti-spyware product, this week released their “Top Ten Unwanted Spyware” list (is any of it actually wanted?)
The list was developed based on data obtained in scans done by Webroot, both from their own site, and in conjunction with Earthlink. The top ten baddies were each detected at least […]

It’s like Godzilla versus King Kong, or Kramer versus Kramer, or something.
CNet news is reporting that adware and spyware (and bears, oh my!) has started targeting competitor wares by detecting and removing them from computers infected by both.
In fact, in a lawsuit filed last month, Avenue Media is accusing competitor Direct Revenue of detecting and […]

Watch out for a software that under disguide of an Internet Accelerator or Anti-virus benevolent activities monitors each and every possible activity you carry out on your computer.
Not only.
The software routes all of a user’s surfing destinations through its own servers. There it analyzes the data to “create research reports on internet trends and […]

[Submitted by Bob Rankin, of TourBus.com]
Is your computer running slower than usual? Has your browser’s start
page been hijacked? Having trouble reaching your favorite search
engine? Popups driving you crazy? Most likely your computer is
infested with spyware, the cockroaches of the digital age.
A recent audit of 4000 UK firms found the […]