Protection disabled

I'll enable all protections in SWB but then the next day or so when I open SWB UI window, I will again see the status that exactly

"183 items have protection disabled..."

Why does this occur?

See:

 

Hi,

What other security/privacy software do you have installed? (i.e. anti-virus, anti-spyware/malware, firewalls, security suites, cleaning/optimizer tools, etc)

Also, could you list a few of the items that are marked as unprotected in the Internet Explorer section of the program?

To easily find them:
1.) Click on the "X items have protection disabled" link. This will display the appropriate section of the program.
2.) Right-click in the "Block List", and choose "Find Unprotected" from the menu option. This will jump to the first unprotected item in the list.

Best regards and thanks,

-Javacool

 

I run Comodo firewall and MSE. Have Malwarebytes installed but not in active mode.

All the unprotected are cookies (BUT not all my cookies). Just selected ones

See:

 

So any ideas yet on WHY this problem is occurring?

 

Hi,

Does the version of Comodo Firewall you have installed offer any sort of "Defense+", "HIPS", "sandboxing" or similar protection modules?

It is possible that it may be interfering with SpywareBlaster a bit. (Did you customize any settings in Comodo to make them more strict than the defaults?)

Best regards and thanks,

-Javacool

 

Yes, I use Defense+. But I have disabled their sandboxing functionality. I've also done some customizations but don't remember exactly what.

 

This happens to me as well. I always have 230 items that need protection on mine. I've found though that if I take the tick out of the Cookie Protection box Internet Explorer will stay protected. On my husbands machine it works with no problems.

I have Windows 7 Home Premium 32 bit running the Windows Firewall, Microsoft Security Essentials, IE9, SpywareBlaster 4.5, MalwareBytes Pro running in real time.

Hubby has Windows 7 Home Premium 64 bit running the Windows Firewall, Microsoft Security Essentials, IE9, SpywareBlaster 4.5, SuperAntiSpyware Pro running in real time.

This has been going on for quite some time and I kept meaning to come here and ask but have now seen you have the same problem.

 

Has anyone thought of anything yet that could be causing this problem.

 

Hi,

It would seem like a significant difference between your machine and your husband's machine is MalwareBytes vs SuperAntiSpyware. (32-bit vs 64-bit shouldn't make a difference in this regard.)

Would it be possible to temporarily disable MalwareBytes on your (problem) machine, to see if it is for some reason removing part of SpywareBlaster's protection? (Or, is MalwareBytes constantly detecting and/or cleaning something? If so, could you provide a log?)

Best regards and thanks,

-Javacool

 

I have Malwarebytes installed but rarely run it, so I doubt that is the problem.

It appears that the items being disabled are tracking cookies. SO the question I have is HOW do you go about doing protection against these type of cookies? Maybe if we know that, we can try to figure out what might be changing the status.

 

I'll try this and get back to you may be a few days though as I'm going to be a bit tied up and not have much time for experimenting for a couple of days.

 

I think the culprit is MalwareBytes, I have the Pro version running in real time so it starts with Windows. If I have the tick in the Cookies box for SpywareBlaster after a reboot or when first starting in the morning there will always be 230 items that need protection for IE, I use version 9, and they are all Cookies.

When I stopped MalwareBytes from starting with Windows and stopped the Protection, so it was just like the free version, having the tick in the Cookie box as well as the ActiveX box in SpywareBlaster, everything was OK and nothing needed protection after starting the machine.

 

@Joan - I only use Malwalbytes for very infrequent scanning and it does not run automatically by itself. So seems doubtful that Malwarebytes is the real culprit.

 

This is happening to me but it only started 5 days ago when I changed to BT and installed there software CD.

In my uninstall list in control panel I can see it has also installed something called go to assist corporate I googled this and it seems to imply that it can see your computer in order to help.(sounds dodgy)

I stress everything was ok until I installed BT software CD.

 

For what it's worth: MBAM does NOT scan for (nor remove) cookies... they're not part of its database.

I am running MBAM PRO (in real time, automatically starting with Windows XP Pro) and all of SpywareBlaster's protection remains intact.

So I don't believe that MBAM is the culprit here. I see where Joan Archer's experiment (disabling MBAM) seems to support the alternative. But I honestly believe that's just a "freaky coincidence"... that there's some other program involved here, that's interfering with the SpywareBlaster protection.

For example, SpyBot's Immunization feature has occasionally been in conflict with SpywareBlaster [in the past]... but it's typcially been over only one or two items. I no longer use Spybot, so I can't test out what its current status is.

EDIT: Joan, could you please confirm your original statement that "I've found though that if I take the tick out of the Cookie Protection box Internet Explorer will stay protected"... you're saying that by REMOVING SpywareBlaster's cookie protection, IE will STAY protected

 

Yes that's correct, I still leave the ActiveX box ticked, whether it's because I use IE9 with it's added security I don't know but as I first stated the only difference in security between mine and my husbands machine is I have Malwarebytes Pro and he has SuperAntiSpyware Pro, both of which run in real time.

 

My protection is still being disabled,are there any new thoughts or updates on this matter yet.

 

So looks like the answer to this problem remains unknown. Should we write this off to just [shrug] resolution?

 

Hi,

The common cause is that something else is either:
(a) Preventing SpywareBlaster from setting its protection (very rare, and mostly caused by things like improperly-configured "sandboxing" programs).
or
(b) Removing some of SpywareBlaster's protection configuration entries after-the-fact.

Unfortunately, we have had reports in the past of some removal tools incorrectly flagging or removing a handful of SpywareBlaster's protection entries. When this happens, we try to reach out to the appropriate company to help them resolve the bugs in their software (as bugs that affect SpywareBlaster's protection can also affect your own configuration settings in the browser you use).

I suspect that for nonnyron, the BT software CD installed a buggy version of some sort of security suite or "optimization" software that is falsely removing some of SpywareBlaster's protection. But I should note: generally, it is not necessary (and also can save your machine from a bunch of unneeded gunk / bundled software) to install any security/software CDs that come from your ISP. You will usually do much better to remove all the gunk that it installed, and choose from one of the many publicly-available, tested, and trusted anti-virus programs on the market (many are available for, or have, free versions).

ibeme99, something on your system is either preventing SpywareBlaster from writing all of the cookie protection entries to the registry, or it is removing them after-the-fact. I cannot reproduce this with MSE (which also generally has a good record of not having these sorts of issues). Do you have anything else on your system that could be affecting access to the registry, "cleaning" the registry, or perhaps performing a "rollback" of changes?

Best regards and thanks,

-Javacool

 

I have so many programs installed on my system that it would be near impossible to guess at anything that is interfering with SWB. I doubt you will solve this unless you have some sort of monitor/trace that watches what you've installed for changes.

You might be able to monitor with something like Sysinternals Process Manager.

 

Sorry I'm late getting back here, been a lot going on, but I can say that in my case everything is as it should be.

I still run the same programs but as they've been upgraded, ie: SpywareBlaster and MalwareBytes have gone to new versions, there doesn't seem to be anymore problems and I can have everything ticked in SpywareBlaster and it stays ticked.

It gives me full protection now in IE without any problems.

Thanks for the help here it's been an interesting if somewhat puzzling problem but I can say I'm now happy that everything is running as it should be.