The unofficial Shadow Defender Support Thread.

About "Tony".....What is going on with him? Here are my questions:

1. Does anyone here personally know him?

2. Does anyone know his first and last name?

3. Does anyone have confirmation he is alive or has passed?

4. If known, what was the nature of the last communication with Tony?

This is such a big curiosity for me because here he had this successful product and (poof!) he disappears. Someone has to know him, who he really is - ICANN surely had proper credentials, payment processors, third-party download management, etc.

Someone has to know the answer. Surely.

 

I believe that I was probably the last person to communicate with Tony (as I knew him) in my role as the Shadow Defender Global Moderator. I had sent him some photos of Blackpool beach in the UK and some descriptions of my home town and the area where I live and recieved a cordial reply. (He would normally reply promptly to emails)
Some time later I sent him some video links to YouTube and he replied that he couldn't watch them because YouTube and some other sites were not allowed in his country and the internet was restricted.
I used to send Tony a weekly spam list of members to remove membership from because as global moderator I only had the power to ban not remove membership, which would leave live links in a members list profile even if I banned them...to porn sites, spam multilink sites etc. (Weirdly many of them were to do with selling shoes.)
Usually Tony would email me and tell me that he had removed them etc but one time I recieved no answer and that was the end of Tony's contact with anyone as far as I know. From that time on none of my emails were answered or pms and Tony didn't appear in the forum and didn't answer Shadow Defender forum members questions or support.
From then on I tried to keep the forum afloat but the spam increased to hundreds of attacks a day (The spammers worked out when I was asleep etc and I'd login to the site only to have to work for ages banning members. The spammers even posted threatening stuff to the site and leaving child porn images throughout the forums. It bacame a battle and I was struggling to keep up without Tony being there and not being able to remove membership. The spammer would register in clumps and it became harder to work out who might be a legitimate member. Sometimes I would let one through and then they would introduce spam a week later. I had so many to get rid of that I used a function on the board to delete lots at the same time but it choked the board because there was a bug (I found out later) in the board software that when it choked would take members and myself to a blank page instead of the forum (The rest of the site remained accessible). So I was locked out of the forum at that point. I managed eventually to get back into the forum using a proxy and as a googlebot and tried to contact Tony to no avail but I still couldn't delete the number on the delete list which was now inaccessible. The only fix to the issue would have been if a person had access to the actual forum on your pc to edit the php or something like that.
I went into the forum periodically after that but all my pms to Tony remained unanswered and emails the same. The forum apart from my access was non active from that point onward.
Then another site sprang up (which was an obvious fake) purporting to be the Shadow Defender site. I wrote and messaged them (it was in the form of a blog) and never recieved and answer, my messages were ignored and deleted.
Then after some time the Shadow Defender site resumed with version 1.1.0.331 but with no Tony, no support, no communication and without explanation just a "new" version and a way to pay. The only version to download was 1.1.0.331. I've visited the Chinese forums and Tony is missing there too, in fact they monitor Wilders for info.
I could give my opinion as to what has happened but that would be only conjecture.
Tony did not have great English but he was present (in English and Chinese) on his own forum for support and questions and had posted on Wilders.
That's all I know.

best wishes

Patrick (Shadow Defender ex Global Moderator)

 

There was one guy that posted here(im not sure where the thread is) that suggested that he did know him personally and that the "official" sd version at the site was legetimate.However this guys postings were as vauge and veiled as tonys disappearance ,and just added to the mystery.

 

I'm weighing in into this conversation mainly because this too much misinformation really bothers me.
Where is this "Tony" from? American? UK? Chinese?

Who knows him in person or by pictures or have spoken to him on the phone?
Does he really exist or, is "he" somebody else who uses different names or nick-names being "Tony" one of those names?

I do not know him and, I "arrived late to the party" [my membership at Wilders dates back to 2008 and it looks like SD is older than that] but, if he's from China [I'm not sure he is or might be, so someone feel free to chime in], why is it so strange that somebody else from that same country might have taken over "his" business with his blessing? Couldn't he have sold the company to focus on some other kind of business that may interest him more? [family business or else]. Was he losing money through SD because of a lot of SD pirated keys floating around on the Internet?

Why are people who don't belong to SD Co. assuming the role of PR [public relations] for that company when they neither work for SD nor develop this software?

If Ford Motors goes bankruptcy and lots of people who had previously purchased this make are left out in the cold driving Fords but without "technical support" [Ford certified mechanics, so to speak], I shouldn't be spreading word like I'm "representing" Ford Motors and telling Fords owners to come to me to "solve" all their woes without being authorized. That's my opinion.

The only thing all these rumors are getting at is to keep most people unsettled.

I'm a person that thinks that if a piece of software works well and does what it's intended and advertised to do, I could care less whether there is technical support or not.
Now, if there have not been reports from people who have purchased the new SD from the "evil" site about losing their identities or having their bank accounts and/or credit cards drained or, SD "1.0.331" having installed a backdoor on the computers where it's installed to listen through open ports...then, why still all the fuss with this subject?



Carlos

 

I think I've explained the situation the best I can, I never claimed at anytime or anywhere to represent the company but like Sandboxie many of us were active in the development of Shadow Defender hoping Tony would be able to develop Shadow Defender Like Shadowuser Pro but to be secure against certain new virus/trojans that were being developed at the time. (I can't remember the name of the virus's/trojans etc...I think a series of "dog" virus)
Shadow Defender was the only software (to my knowledge) at the time of 1.1.0.325 to be able to fight of these new attacks but Tony was unable to make the software do what he had promised (in the timescale that he mentioned on open forum) making it so that if you installed a software from within Shadow Mode that required a reboot for full install it would "stick" after reboot.
Shadow Defender like First Defense ISR has achieved cult status as a classic piece of software where the development ended prematurely which explains the ongoing interest.

Patrick (ex Shadow Defender Mod)

 

Now let us all sit back and enjoy Shadow Defender as it is - excellent. The only thing we can do now is hope tony is well and wish him all the best and give thanks to patrick (sdmod) as well for all the support.

 

Again I think that all this info plus the links to the safe Tony versions and Digital River links should all be stickied to a page within this forum, a page where new users can go, read, and make up their own minds about using the program or not.

Regarding what you wrote about Tony: You've done your best to keep the forum afloat all alone and you should be congratulated for your effort. The sudden cease of communication - which seems to have been so uncharacteristic of Tony - is just bizzare. I remember the fake SD blog-style site you mentioned, they only had one version available (no x32 or x64 variants).

 

I think that the fact of the owners of the SD site refuse to communicate with people doesn't necessarily make them "evil" or practicing shady business practices.
Unless we have hard proof of any "wrongdoing" they may have done, all our thoughts about them is just pure speculation.

In fact, I see some are trying [or already have] to make a dent on their business by spreading "information". SD is not widely known beyond Wilders Security forums, DSL Reports forums, Remove-Malware forums et al., therefore, every potential customer they may have which but some here have turned away by directing them to download an old non-SD sponsored build just because it's "safe" whereas theirs is "bad" is hurting their pockets. They could seek damages compensation by suing in court should they decide to do so and, would be perfectly legal form a business standpoint because some here are accusing them of "shady" practices without any hard evidence or proof to backup those statements.

If people want to purchase SD and do not have a valid and legal license for it, would it be fair to direct them to a link at at, let's say Rapidshare to download an old build and then what? Who is going to give or grant them a valid and legal license number? The "unofficial" representative of SD?

The fact they do not communicate with anyone doesn't necessarily make them "evil".



Carlos

 

Well the fact that they dont communicate with anyone breaks their own website "promise" ,unless someone knows otherwise.
.........................
Registered Users will get
Get our free technical support with E-mail
.........................
So has anyone forked out money and actually got technical support via email?

 

There is not a judge in the world that would ever blame the legitimate buyers of any product or service, for voicing their opinions, concerns, and speculations when:

1) The person we all knew as the developer (Tony) suddenly drops out of the face of the planet with no warning or further communication whatsoever.

2) Soon after that all official SD support stops, with no explanation given by the current developer why this is the case.

3) The SD forum gets highjacked by spammers and is eventually abandoned, despite the valiant efforts of SD forum admins Patrick and Hawkwind.

4) A new SD version is released without a changelog or any comments from the now unknown developer.

5) The SD domain expires but is then restored, so someone eventually paid the bills.

6) A fake blog site pops up also selling SD but a slightly different version... ...with its support linking to the official SD website. The file they were flogging could have been a recompiled version of Tony's work, it was a single file for both x32 and x64.

7) Any attempts for contact by customers have been met with complete silence by the current unknown owners.

In the meantime the program keeps selling without any communication or support given whatsoever. Nobody can blame people for trying to make sense of a weird and possibly shady situation!

 

It is not true that Shadow Defender is not widely known beyond Wilders forum, the whole "Tony missing" issue has been massively debated on Chinese forums. As I've said before on this forum, a piece of security software is much more that whether the download is available and can be registered and whether it seems to "work" or not. Lots of Chinese Shadow Defender users read this forum and if the "new" owners are now developing this software surely they would simply make public their intentions with an explanation as to what has happened. If it was effecting sales you would imagine that they would be the first to shout out their legitimacy.
As for threats of sueing etc...this is laughable, who are they going to sue and for what?
I challenge (again) the new developers to come forward and prove their legitimacy.

 

Just let's pretend I'm a new computer user and, some friend talked to me about protecting it with a layered security solution that may include SD.

I hear about the product and what it does and then, I feel highly motivated to purchase a brand new Serial Number [S/N or License].
I do some Internet research and land at Wilders Forums. Here, I read about it and someone tells me that the SD build advertised at shadowdefender[dot]com is not legitimate and offers me a link to 1.0.325 at Rapidshare.
Trusting that person, I download it, install it on my PC but...it installs on trial mode giving me only 30-days trial until I purchase a Serial Number [S/N or License].

From who I'm going to purchase this new license [S/N]? Form the person who gave me the link to .325 at Rapidshare? or...Is he going to share his S/N with me so I can use it on as many PC installations as I want to and can give that S/N away to as many friends as I want to?

Are we promoting piracy?

Whether we like it or not, those people running SD web-site are the legitimate owners and we have no reason to think or believe they stole it from the former owner because we have no proof of otherwise.


Carlos

 

Hi Carlos, no we can't know for sure what is going on, but we can have a pretty good idea... Since Tony's disappearance there have been several strong indications that something shady may be going on. The continued lack of communication by the current owners has become the greatest indicator/problem. It would have been in their best interests to come forward and explain the current state of affairs, but to this day they still haven't done this. No legitimate developer would be silent like that, no legitimate developer would allow such uncertainty and negative customer feedback to perpetuate. They would have come forward a long time ago to give their side of the story. But as I pointed out already, they would do this only if they were truly legitimate.

On the other hand: If they are not legitimate, then they would just carry on being silent and try to sell as many copies of the program as they can while the party is still on, hoping that such negative discussions among existing customers are eventually going to fade away.

Let's not argue semantics here. If it looks like a duck, swims like a duck, and quacks like a duck, then we have at the very least to consider the very probable possibility that it might be a freakin' duck. And in this case it looks like one hell of a superduck! This is more like ...DuckZilla.

Regarding your piracy comment, I think it was quite misplaced and unfortunate. I haven't seen anyone around here exchanging serial numbers or promoting/condoning piracy, have you? This is not what this forum is about. Giving out links for the older Tony versions to new SD users, how can this resemble piracy? Your conclusion makes no sense to me. Please understand that I'm not trying to be funny with you here, or show you disrespect in any shape or form. I just don't understand how can a person reject and then choose to ignore those very logical and obvious indications that something may be seriously wrong over at SD...

BTW if new users try the proggie and want to buy a license (which can also be used with the older SD versions), all they have to do is buy it from one of the Digital River affiliates. I have posted links for those a few days ago on this thread. If I was a new SD user I'd want to buy it from a reputable site, rather than having to pass my credit card details directly over to the unknown folk at SD.

 

If you want to buy it from the new site or not then do that, it's no skin off my nose, I don't have anything to lose or gain either way.

 

Thank you for you reply.

Could you point me out a web-site other than shadowdefender[dot]com where I can purchase a legit Serial Number, please?

I don't care much about the .exe file [the SD installer] as I can Google it and download it elsewhere, it's the S/N that matters me most now.

Thanks.

Carlos

 

A cursory 15 second google search was all it took to land a legitimate Digital River affilate link for SD... Here's the post for it as I mentioned earlier - and ignore the fact that PC World hosts an older version: You only need that page for the "Buy Full Version" button which will redirect you to Digital River for the order.

My original post with the link:
https://www.wilderssecurity.com/showpost.php?p=2046006&postcount=722

The link itself:
http://www.pcworld.com/downloads/file/fid,94761-order,2/description.html

It is starting to get tiresome having to repeat the SD facts and re-give all the links over and over again to new people everytime. It is even more tiresome when people who have been unaware of the situation until recently are still doubting the existence of the elephant in the room. We need to stickie this info! Any admins around?

 

It seems to be a growing thread with repeated questions,So your point of a stickie is a good idea.It's all up to the mods now.

 

Carlos,

I may have misunderstood your comments, but I have to say I've read this entire thread (plus others SD threads on Wilders) and I've never seen anyone pointing to illegitimate (warez) sites.

Because the 'new' shadowdefender.com doesn't provide downloads of past builds, some of us (myself included) have uploaded past SD builds to legitimate file-hosting websites, but they have been the setup files only, nothing else. So I have to ask you, who is promoting piracy?

TS

 

Hi Zyrtec

What I would advise, you should make sure of is that wherever you do download from, that the MD5 Checksum are the same as the original:-

Shadow Defender 1.1.0.325 x32 [SD1.1.0.325_Setup]
MD5 Checksum:- 4ED0F50233680FFC37FBE5CF8057C634

Shadow Defender 1.1.0.325 x64 [SD1.1.0.325_Setup(x64)]
MD5 Checksum:- 35EDF53C0B4D3B8960047CFBFCBAE7E3

Take Care
TheQuest

 

The checksums I have are

SD1.1.0.325_Setup.exe
101CDC867F7771FAAE6810483EF16439

SD1.1.0.325_Setup(x64).exe
35EDF53C0B4D3B8960047CFBFCBAE7E3

 

Lordy lordy, are we re-re-re-hashing the MD5-checksum issue again?

Pa

 

Shadow,

Please, re-read my post [the one you are quoting].

When I asked [asking, not affirming], if piracy was being promoted was because whenever somebody new to these forums comes and asks where to get the installer and, of course...the S/N for SD they are given an external link to a file-sharing site to download version 1.0.325 and hence, I was assuming the license would also be included there since everyone here discourages people from purchasing SD licenses and/or serial numbers from shadowdefender[dot]com site thus, I wondered once these newcomers got the 1.0.325 installer, where did they also get the S/N from?

In regards to all the commotion caused by "Tony" this, "Tony" that, "shady" web-site or else, I'm just tired and sick of it thus, I've rested my case.


I hope to have clarified my latest statements for you.


Carlos

 

sdmod,

Thanks for a very detailed answer to my question. I appreciate the time you took. It certainly gives a perspective that should be known before anyone purchases from the SD site that is now available to sell the product through Digital River - yet no communication from whoever is running it now. I think with Tony's reputation, it's clear he is out of the picture and no longer involved.

Like you, I have my suspicions and a theory (or two) about the disappearance of the man we knew as "Tony." It's obvious he was a whiz and has a lot to offer.

Again, thank you for your first hand knowledge of the last hours of Shadow Defender as we knew it.

Where's "48 Hours Mystery" when you need them?

 

I would agree, that has been overdone, but we somehow tend to rehash (and rehash) many issues.

After all is said and done (over and over again), SD is an elegant 'cult' program. It is relatively simple to operate, so it requires minimal support, and when questions do arise they are quickly answered in this forum.

 

Here is SD Download for People who already have a Serial.

SD 3.25 (32-bit)

http://www.multiupload.nl/S2GFFT4GUE

MD5: 101CDC867F7771FAAE6810483EF16439

SHA1: E879EBFF5F807597E883734D589FE6478B805069

SHA256:F4472AEDFC97A1B8313173609B8BD83FBACCFF21D3ED8927EA359F79D9AA9020


Virustotal:
https://www.virustotal.com/file/f44...d3ed8927ea359f79d9aa9020/analysis/1336722692/