“Talk about a lost weekend! As I write this Monday, I’ve just spent the better part of two days trying to remove adware and spyware from my wife’s computer. I’m not done yet,” Mike Wendland reports for The Detroit Free Press. “Adware and spyware are terms that are used pretty much interchangeably to describe hidden programs that settle surreptitiously into your hard drive to collect information on your Internet surfing habits so they can then display advertisements in your Web browser. These pernicious programs have become the scourge of the Internet.”
Wendland reports, “If you’re a Windows user, I can just about guarantee you have some on your machine. They get there in sneaky, sleazy ways, usually piggybacking on some free program or application you downloaded. Then they imbed themselves into out-of-the-way places on your hard drive.”
“The practice is so unscrupulous that Internet security circles now refer to adware and spyware as malware, as in malicious software — a term that used to be relegated strictly to worms and viruses,” Wendland reports. “That’s because slimy advertisers, borrowing the techniques of hackers, have written their come-ons and dubious offers into computer code that is almost impossible for the casual user to detect and almost as difficult to remove — which is why I’ve been tied up so long scrubbing my wife’s Dell… When I used a bunch of different spyware cleaning programs to sweep her machine, I found over 200 different spyware apps imbedded in her system. Dumping them is not an easy task. Each sweep takes about a half-hour, and I’ve had to run dozens of sweeps.”
Wendland reports, “This is a problem that is almost totally tied to Microsoft Windows. I mostly use Apple Macintosh computers. In two years of doing so, I have never had a single instance of spyware or adware infestation… The spyware problem is getting worse, and sooner or later, you’re going to have to deal with it — and regularly keep dealing with it. Unless, of course, you get a Mac.”
Full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Get a Mac is good advice, Mike, but what’s your wife doing with a Dell in the first place?
For our Windows-only friends interested in a better way, you can find information about adding a safe, secure, powerful, and fun Mac OS X machine to your computing arsenal here.
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Preach Detroit Free Press! Preach!
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Praise the Apple!
over 200 million songs downloaded from iTunes, and not 1 single virus. Gotta love Apple.
Joe
People: Please take the link to this story from the Detroit Press and provide a link to it on personal computing-related discussion groups. Better yet, Mossberg/WSJ article from last week. Write something nice, like “Here’s a guy who has lost tons of time and suffered lost productivity because of Windows. He’s also worked with Macs and says he’ll never work with a Windows PC again,” or something similar.
The next couple of years are an incredible opportunity for Apple. We as the Mac’s biggest fans can use word of mouth to at least quadruple the number of people who are thinking about switcing from Windows.
We Mac people sometimes have a reputation for being elitist. No one wants to join a club that they think is populated by arrogant snobs. Let’s try the above, and truly win some converts, instead of increasing their resistance to change by telling them how stupid they are for not using a Mac.
A drop of honey will attract more flies than a gallon of gall. Do it NOW! Mac user’s citizen action for a better computing future!
I don’t know where you guys get your info, but mac sucks, they don’t have anything like Microsoft office, you can’t get any software for it, and don’t say that it doesns’t get spyware, cuz every computer gets spyware, havn’t you ever had a pop-up?
They make a product like the IPod, and through millions of dollars in advertiseing get you all to believe that it is the best mp3 player in the world, but you can get a dell jukebox (with a built in voice recorder), that has more battory life, and costs less, you all are stupid.
as i type, there is this add to my right (of the page), that is blinking and tilling me that if i shoot a fly I get an “IMac g5”, really apple, can’t you think of better advertising methods then this?
you should all head on over to dell ( http://www.dell.com/ ) and insted of buying a $700 ipod, you can get a Inspiron 1000, that has a prosessor that is twice as fast a your “IMac g5”
Mike Heinman
You’re kidding right Mike?
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mike…er, troll.
That ad is not from Apple. There is no $700 iPod. Also your spelling is atrocious (that means lousy). Pop Ups are not spyware, and for your information Safari eliminates pop ups (if you desire) as do some ISPs. How old are you? 10 or maybe 11?
Mike Mike Mike …. ever hear of Office for Mac OS X ?
No I suppose not.
Spyware like Windows get’s does not exist on the Mac.
Nor do viruses.
Check With McAfee, Symantec and all the others for the last time they had to issue an update for a virus on the Mac. It’s been a while. And there never has been anywhere near as many ciruses on the Mac even when there were more.
As for Del”s jukebox, third partyu review after thrid party review has consistently found the iPod to be superior.
As for the ad you think that’s Apple’s ad ? I doubt it. Probably one of the other vendors who advertise here.
As for teh Inspiron, I have lots of PC’s already and really don’t need any more headaches. Thanks but I’ll use my Macs for work and the PC’s for testing. At least the PC’s I can reformat when hey get bogged down in spyware and keep working on my Mac’s earning a nice living.
Have a nice day Mike.
Mike: re “, they don’t have anything like Microsoft office” – Mac’s version of Microsoft office (*by* microsft BTW) isw better than its windows counterpart – even their windows counterparts admit it.
You do need to get some FACTS before spouting off like you are a sandwich short of a picnic
Let them use Windows and suffer the consequences. I don’t care. It’s their choice, especially the ones that trash Macs…. so out dated, man.
As for me and my house (and work), I’ll continue to use Macs and spend my time actually “using” the computer than serving it.
Cheers.
you are all to biast to see that i am right. even when truth is staring you right in the face, you denie it. Well you guys all just keep making up reasons why you think that macs are better, wile i actuily get some work done.
I bet none of you have even tried the dell jukebox, or even a windows computer, you can’t get any games for the mac either, now excuess me wile i go and play halo 2.
Mike Heinman
OK Mike, I’m no expert but here goes…..
–I don’t know where you guys get your info, but mac sucks, they don’t have anything like Microsoft office,–
Actually they do have something very similar to Microsoft Office. It’s called Microsoft Office for Mac.
–you can’t get any software for it, and don’t say that it doesns’t get spyware, cuz every computer gets spyware, havn’t you ever had a pop-up?–
You’re right there Mike we do get heaps of spyware and viruses and stuff, but you have to understand that these things are written to specifically run on a windows platform. Simply because it is a windows dominated world. So yes we can and often do ‘get’ the virus or whatever, but it just sits there on our hard drives doing nothing thinking ‘whatdya want from me ?’. Its a bit like putting a pPlaystation game into you’re Xbox. Nothings gonna happen.
–They make a product like the IPod, and through millions of dollars in advertiseing get you all to believe that it is the best mp3 player in the world, but you can get a dell jukebox (with a built in voice recorder), that has more battory life, and costs less, you all are stupid.–
It’s all personal opinion. I’d love an iPod, but for me it’s not quite worth the money for what it does. I’d rather wait and see if an iPod with true video out capabilites emerges. Which may or may not happen. Who’s vain enough to want to record their voice anyway ? But thats just my opinion. Besides, Sony has something big planned for next year, I’m prepared to wait a bit longer and see what happens.
–as i type, there is this add to my right (of the page), that is blinking and tilling me that if i shoot a fly I get an “IMac g5”, really apple, can’t you think of better advertising methods then this?–
I live in Australia, we don’t get any advertising at all for Mac stuff.
–you should all head on over to dell ( http://www.dell.com/ ) and insted of buying a $700 ipod, you can get a Inspiron 1000, that has a prosessor that is twice as fast a your “IMac g5”
Mike Heinman–
I’ve never heard of that. Thanks for the heads up. I will check that out and add it to my list of options. A little advice for you (i’m not telling you what to do, i’m trying to be nice about this) see if you can score yourself a cheap second hand bomb of a Mac from somewhere. Not to try and convert you but just so you get more of an idea of what they are actually like. We Mac users are more than aware of how PCs work, not fully of course. But because it is a PC dominated world and we Mac heads have to live in it, we are forced to get some idea of the PCs way of doing things simply so we can keep our heads above the water.
Think Different
Very funny, Mike.
Your last name really is Hunt, isn’t it?
Seems appropriate.
Maybe not “Hunt,” but CERTAINLY “Moron”! (BTW, as a former English teacher of 24 years–high school, middle school, and junior high–I recognize Mike’s attempts at phonetically-based spelling and puerile sentence constructs as that of an intellectually and emotionally arrested teenager who is simply trying to defend his turf . . . in vain.)
Perhaps we should cut “Mike” some slack here, folks. He has more problems than ANY of us can address with sufficiency in this forum!
I would just like you all to know, It was all a joke. My name isn’t really mike, I love macs, and I was bored, I was trying to (make mike) look stupid, and it worked. Now I am laughing at you all.
VinitaBoy got me 5 laughs, thanks for that VintaBoy.
Half of the stuff I used wasn’t mine, I was talking with a windows chap yesterday, and he said most of what I did here.
So HAHAHA to you all, you suckers got punked.
Mike Jewman.
So mike, you are 10 years old. Not funny.
Maybe Mike didn’t had the right tools to do the job.
Take a look at this:
http://www.tweakhound.com/xp/security/page_1.htm
That all you need neatly explained.
And remember use FireFox and ThunderBird instead of IE and Outlook
Jacques
You… baStard Mike. It took me around 10 minutes to explain all that stuff to you.
nice one, merry xmas, NOT
Mike… i think the well-adjusted and intelligent of us could see right through the transparent “mac-hatred” you fallaciously feigned (is that done good ingrish?)
Speaking of defending one’s turf… man, no one understands sarcasm now… even when it’s about as blatant as a wine stain on a a white shirt.
You… baStard Mike. It took me around 10 minutes to explain all that stuff to you.
and 10 seconds to realize it was all wasted… oh well, there’s something to be said for reiteration…
preaching to the choir.
well I got a kick out of it.
well I got a kick out of it
O.K. One more time. Put a switch on the computer. The switch turns OFF the disk drive. Tell me how you can get a virus with the disk turned off? Somebody, C’mon. I’ve been using a wintel computer for 5 YEARS, without a virus. That’s five YEARS. O.K., I made that up about the five year’s, wintel thing, but that’s not the point of course. Well?
I knew there were some VERY stupid Windows users out there, but those comments from Mike were too stupid for even the most challenged of Windows users.
Still, some of the attempts to help the faux moron were fun.
It was totally obvious that Mike wasn’t real. I mean, you have to look real hard to find that kind of ignorance. Besides, he was telling us what an idiot he was through the way he butchered the English language.
While I was reading this thread, I wondered what is the payoff in “punking” the people visiting MDN? Is it really all that fun to fool people whose intentions are to educate someone who is uninformed? When someone lies to me and laughs at me for it, I simply stop having anything to do with that person. And I don’t believe that my reaction is uncommon.
Mike, you will grow up to be a very lonely guy.
Montex,
Aha, but don’t you see? I was bored! plus, “mike” isn’t my real name! I never have to use the name “mike” again! So no one knows who I am!
I think it was very funny.
Mike (not really)