There’s A Sucker Downloading Every Minute

A new client called me this week with a description of a slow computer. After he recited the various things that were probably wrong, we made an appointment for me to stop and take a look. In preparation for the meeting I asked him to perform a disk cleanup and defragmentation. He seemed to be up to speed on his anti-virus software, but something was slowing him down. I suggested that he find Spybot S&D by searching on Google, download, install, and run it. If he did that before I came over, we might have a better idea of what was going on.

The day before our meeting, he called to say he had run Spybot and it found 2383 problems, but he did not know what to do next. That’s interesting.

The next day I looked at his computer and noticed an icon on his desktop that I did not recognize, but is said Spybot something or another. That’s interesting. I clicked it open and a window announced 2383 problems with an impressive list of just what they were. But the kicker came when I was invited to send them some money to allow removal. No money: no action.

“How did you get this?” I asked. We reproduced his keystrokes and confirmed that by searching on Spybot Search & Destroy, the first two links (sponsored) are for something that is not Spybot Search & Destroy, but looks like it. He had simply clicked on the first listing and downloaded the alternative that was now on his desktop waiting to be fed some money.

I suppose that is fair. The links were plainly labeled as sponsored, and the correct link was third down on the list. The names were similar, but different. Only the unaware would get the wrong choice as my client did.

So I fixed him up with the correct download and uninstalled the other. Then I ran a scan and found 52 problems which Spybot S&D quickly disposed of, but the big surprise was that two of the examples of unwanted visitors were from the mistaken download that had been uninstalled. Yes, the software that was advertised to remove spybots actually seems to place them. I suppose that, too, is fair.

Contrast this to the way we attacked another of his problems. We downloaded and installed Startup Inspector. In moments we had disabled a flock of items that had been slowing his boot. I was conservative in choosing things to disable because my main mission is tutoring. Once he knew how to organize things, my job would be done.

There are many great things available to novices for free download without going near Sourceforge, but how can a tutor meaningfully protect students from getting suckered into installing things they do not really want?

My clients and students have made trouble for themselves in Windows in many ways in spite of all the human engineering embedded in it (Yes, I know that Windows bashers will question whether any human engineering has ever gone into any Windows, but it certainly has.) What would happen to them if Windows and the Apple-based systems did not exist? Could they pick up Linux? Really?

BTW, I installed a healthy slug of additional DRAM, cleaned up the icons, organized the start menu, and uninstalled several things. His computer now runs much faster and he is a happy camper. Before we left, he showed me a patch on the wall in his living room on the wall shared with his office. A moonlighting tech had tried to install a wired network to his upstairs computer by drilling inside the wall and ran into a large hidden beam. The drill somehow went sideways and out into the living room. The tech decided to try a wireless network, but was unable to make his Linksys work. My client has no operating LAN, but has all the parts. We made an appointment for me to come back. My interest in him is not so much the hardware problems. He is into some interesting projects and needs some tutoring on how to do them, but these hurdles are in our way.

Click here to read about my new tutorial on helping seniors. The new version has grown considerably over the original. It has more topics and anecdotes, and fewer typos. While you’re at it, check out my expanded tutorial on decision theory.

[tags]spyware, malware[/tags]