SG1
June 6th, 2006, 05:36 AM
So, yesterday Spybot S&D informs me that I had a browser hijacker:
the unexpected guest was CnsMin, related to 3721 dot com (bought by
Yahoo! in 2003 whereas Google bought part of 3721's competitor,
baidu dot com in '04, I think it was. BTW, if you have a sense of
irony I think it was Yahoo! that sold out some poor schmuck dissident
in China to the authorities, via online logs of the guy's activity).
Anyway: while online I run Ewido, RegDefend, PG, A-squared Guard, Sygate Pro firewall, TrojanHunter Guard, NOD32, Spysweeper, Window Washer, Online Armor, (Wallwatcher logging for the router), and A Really Small App that tells one about connection/s to other PCs, if any, among other things.
There's also a few things in the "background" like Spywareblaster and Spybot that have put their stamp on things so to speak and are at work too. There's likely other security programs I have run through, once, as "set and forget" types re settings for OS overall security, and left them to their own devices. So, it's not like I'm a slacker here: or at least I've
tried/bought many an app, for alleged PC protection.
But, at one point I happened to run Spybot after an update, which found said hijacker. Now, assuming "the best" security apps may find 70% of stuff, this tells me that bad guys are smarter/quicker than forces of all combined good guys about 30% of the time then, is that about it?
Call me a rube if you like, but I'm a bit dismayed over this as you may
guess, and in part I'm wondering about the why-how-where-when of how this came to pass and this was nothing esp. nasty as far as that goes. Any downloads come from trusted sites, or so I thought: we don't do music, porn sites or any of that, and the download Dir is scanned by several apps before I install a program, and most all of stuff I get IS security or utility type, of programs.
And as far as that goes, I tried X-Cleaner (Free) and it says I had some
type of adware toolbar in IE which I didn't as far as I could see, & they
even had image of said toolbar on their site of what adware toolbar would look like - and I don't see that toolbar in IE (that my brother uses, but I most always run Firefox, or sometimes Opera). So... what should I make of all this, the overall security scene in general and the seeming failure of 99.9% of my paid-for security apps, to be more specific?
OR, am I completely wrong on this? If my browser/s were not redirected to another site against my will - did the security apps do their job? If they did, how/why did Spybot alleged hijacker after the fact? OR, could it have been an FP on the part of Spybot)?
And, peering into the Registry for 3721 references, it is possibly related
to Foxmail (that I got from Answersthatwork dot com, where I bought the app, The Ultimate Troubleshooter). I say that, as I see something about 3721/Chinese Mail related to Foxmail in the Reg., so I've uninstalled that just in case).
Thanks for any thoughts, on this: or, if you enlighten me on how I may
have misunderstood all my security program/inner workings, great, as I'll learn something that way, too.
SG1 (Pat)
the unexpected guest was CnsMin, related to 3721 dot com (bought by
Yahoo! in 2003 whereas Google bought part of 3721's competitor,
baidu dot com in '04, I think it was. BTW, if you have a sense of
irony I think it was Yahoo! that sold out some poor schmuck dissident
in China to the authorities, via online logs of the guy's activity).
Anyway: while online I run Ewido, RegDefend, PG, A-squared Guard, Sygate Pro firewall, TrojanHunter Guard, NOD32, Spysweeper, Window Washer, Online Armor, (Wallwatcher logging for the router), and A Really Small App that tells one about connection/s to other PCs, if any, among other things.
There's also a few things in the "background" like Spywareblaster and Spybot that have put their stamp on things so to speak and are at work too. There's likely other security programs I have run through, once, as "set and forget" types re settings for OS overall security, and left them to their own devices. So, it's not like I'm a slacker here: or at least I've
tried/bought many an app, for alleged PC protection.
But, at one point I happened to run Spybot after an update, which found said hijacker. Now, assuming "the best" security apps may find 70% of stuff, this tells me that bad guys are smarter/quicker than forces of all combined good guys about 30% of the time then, is that about it?
Call me a rube if you like, but I'm a bit dismayed over this as you may
guess, and in part I'm wondering about the why-how-where-when of how this came to pass and this was nothing esp. nasty as far as that goes. Any downloads come from trusted sites, or so I thought: we don't do music, porn sites or any of that, and the download Dir is scanned by several apps before I install a program, and most all of stuff I get IS security or utility type, of programs.
And as far as that goes, I tried X-Cleaner (Free) and it says I had some
type of adware toolbar in IE which I didn't as far as I could see, & they
even had image of said toolbar on their site of what adware toolbar would look like - and I don't see that toolbar in IE (that my brother uses, but I most always run Firefox, or sometimes Opera). So... what should I make of all this, the overall security scene in general and the seeming failure of 99.9% of my paid-for security apps, to be more specific?
OR, am I completely wrong on this? If my browser/s were not redirected to another site against my will - did the security apps do their job? If they did, how/why did Spybot alleged hijacker after the fact? OR, could it have been an FP on the part of Spybot)?
And, peering into the Registry for 3721 references, it is possibly related
to Foxmail (that I got from Answersthatwork dot com, where I bought the app, The Ultimate Troubleshooter). I say that, as I see something about 3721/Chinese Mail related to Foxmail in the Reg., so I've uninstalled that just in case).
Thanks for any thoughts, on this: or, if you enlighten me on how I may
have misunderstood all my security program/inner workings, great, as I'll learn something that way, too.
SG1 (Pat)