IE SPAM Ads....

[skykak]

Seems to be happening more frequently lately....
The "push" for SPAM reform (?) has taken on a new face. MS has started dropping nice little unwelcomed banners onto my desktop.
It is very simple to "X" out of them but....the very idea! Just today I was asked if my septic tank was working OK. I don't have one so, obviously, the ad was random and to unknown thousands of IE users.
Can this be blocked without going to another ISP? I will try Netscape again but I switched away for the same reason.
Your thoughts? How can I actually get a live person to read my words after one of these pieces of crap? BC

 

[carrr]

For starters, use SpyBot (

http://security.kolla.de/)

on a regular rotation.
This isn't spam, per se, but rather spyware, adware, and malicious Browser Helper Objects that crop up to annoy and overrun.
You can also try BHODemon (this allows you to disable on-board parasites, but not remove them. (

http://www.definitivesolutions.com/bhodemon.htm)

As a Windows 98 user, you don't have the luxury of disabling Windows Messenger Service, and avenue that many of these pests are using more and more (if your ads generally come in in the familiar grey box with blue header nar, this is the source).
Keeping your cookies cleaned out if a good way to avoid many ads, like the X10 camera, as these ads depend on cookies to propagate. By setting opt-out cookies, you can avoid a lot of ads. This is a good starter reference for how to begin (while the name suggests otherwise, this is a legit anti-spam, adware site):

http://technoerotica.net/mylog/optouts.html

Good luck...

 

[Crustyoldbloke]

Hello Skykak

Carr is right as usual, and I fully endorse his comments about SPYBOT. The latest is version 1.2 which has an immunization feature especially for IE. I believe it stops around 250 known nasties from entering the PC. I also concur with Carr about the cookie turn off feature, although some sites rely on them for entry (online banking et al).

Also whilst on this subject, have you noticed how much spam is coming in by Email? I am averaging 15 per day ranging from the sublime to the ridiculous. Most are from North America and the senders promise to "check out my neighbour" or grant me "the cheapest mortgage around" - problem is I'm in the UK. It has become so ridiculous that I am now using MAILWASHER an excellent programme for FREE that allows me to see what the server has for me without downloading. I can then choose if I want to allow the message onto my PC or bounce it back from whence it came and blacklist the remote server in future.

Kind regards

Phil

 

[carrr]

Good point, Phil. Scrubbing out the cookies does make it more difficult to do business with legitiamte sites, not to mention, Tek-Tips won't remmber your login on your next vist, as I found out long ago. I've accepted the trade-off, as a ritual cookie-deleter, that I may have to take the long way around some legitimate transactions. It is worth mulling this fact over, skykak, before you embrace some of our protection strategies.
And yes...I wonder where some of these spam emails come from. I receive everything from ads guaranteeing to enlarge my manhood (how did they know?) to bulk vitamin distibutors to cheaper mortgage rates. The real pain is that the return emails are most often duds to which I'm unable to return a profanity-laden response. So...I just forward everything to the Federal Trade Commission...doing my part to justify a bureaucratic extension...

 

[jmatt]

I use any of these Free browsers , which have a built in pop up stopper . ( don't add ,
About Blank , to your filter list )
Use very little resources ( No Add's ) & are as good as any other browser .
Intergrates quitely into your system , do not take over . You can still run your normal browser ,
if you wish .

http://www.crazybrowser.com/

MyIE Web Browser ( not Nemesis MyIE ) from ,

http://www.ruihehang.com/myie2/html_en/home.htm

http://www.majorgeeks.com/article.php?sid=1244

http://www.webattack.com/Freeware/misctools/fwbrowser.shtml

Avant

http://www.avantbrowser.com/

Opera

http://www.operasoftware.com/

Mozilla

http://www.mozilla.org/

--------------------------------------------------

If you want to try a really good email client & Spam remover , this one is very good .

I can look at my mail on the ISP's server , delete ( spam removal ) , reply , click on links & if I want it on my comp ,
click on Move to > Archive .
Use right click for most of the functions .

You can still leave any other email client installed . Just a matter of choosing which one you want as default .

http://geminisoft.com/geminisoft.eng/

Pimmy - Your personal postman.

Geminisoft Pimmy lets you manage your electronic mail easily and everywhere you are. The full
program may be put on a floppy!
What you can do using Pimmy:

* manage an unlimited number of mailboxes;
* read and write messages on newsgroups;
* check for new messages and be warned about them;
* file messages in folders;
* automatically download mail and newsgroup messages from the mailboxes you desire to one or
more folders;
* read on-line only the message in which you are interested in, not downloading all and
leaving mail on the server until you decide to delete them;
* read a preview of a message on-line not reading it completely or dowloading it;
* delete a message on-line not reading it completely or dowloading it;
* write your messages off-line and send them when connected to Internet, moving all sent
messages in a special folder;
* send messages using different providers easily;
* manage an address book;
* manage different signatures (even with only one mailbox);
* attach files and documents;
* chat with other Pimmy users, even with more than one at the same time.

 

[killowhat]

crusty; tried mailwasher again and finally it works . so far. have you had any problems with it?

 

[Crustyoldbloke]

Hello Pearl

No probs at all.

Kind regards

Phil

 

[dakota81]

Just wait until you upgrade to XP! =Þ

People out somewhere figured out how to mass exploit the Windows Messanger service and will send spam advertisements to anyone and they don't even have to have any software running on their machines!

Makes me sad every time I'm in one of our XP labs at my university and an ad pops up; I look around, and it's up on every single computer in the room.

Windows Messenger can easily be disabled, so don't worry much about that.

 

[4XXXX]

I agree with all the above posts. I would just like to tell you about a little programme called Cookie Wall I recently installed.

This allows me to save the cookies I want i.e. the log on information to this site, to block the undesirable kind and also to clear new cookies as the arrive. You can download it from this site:

http://netsecurity.about.com/gi/dyn...logx.com/contents/download/network/cookie.htm

 

[killowhat]

try spywareblaster.

 

[Grenage]

Aye, we use Spybot here and I can't recommend it enough. We also use Opera for browsing (

http://www.opera.com)

since it has in-built effect add control, which doesnt block out popups you actually want.

All good stuff.

 

[rrsub]

Not trying to sound mean but...

You know, all these issues are IE specific. Stop using IE. I use Netscape and Mozilla on diferent systems. I don't have any of that garbage problems posted here and I have features that IE doesn't have like:

Tabbed browsing. I can pull up my home page, middle click the links I want to go to then click on the tabs to read the content.

Popup blocker. Enough said.

Download manager. Resume from disconected downloads. (works really well for dial-up)

NO spyware from MS integrated in the browser.

 

[dakota81]

Reply to rrsub:

These are definately not IE specific issues; M$ does not incorporate spyware or any other kind of ad software into their browser. They just do not offer an option to block popup ads, which are legit java scripts written by the web page author.

Pop-up ads are not spyware, nor are they any type of ad software. Once you close down the windows, your machine will not receive information because of the pop-up nor will any information be sent to those sites. Cookies are a whole other issue, and I'm not going into detail of how the browsers handle them.

The problem is additional software that gets installed onto the machine. If Netscape & Mozilla become more popular, spyware plugins will most definately be more common for those browsers too. Do not think you're ammune to any harm.


Bottom Line: just be cautious of installing any free software taken from a website, and occasionally run a spyware removal program; I use Ad-Aware, though they are all good programs.

 

[rrsub]

Reply to dakota81:

This isn't the place for this and I don't want the tone to get sour but these ARE IE specific. I use a mix of browsers for website testing and IE is consistent for this kind of garbage.

It's not only javascript which can happen on all browsers but it's also ActiveX which is IE specific. How does Hotbar, Comet Cursor, and Gator get installed without the user knowing?

Pop-ups can place a cookie which can be checked by other mechanisms but that is a whole other story.

Spyware plugins for other browsers require a whole different type of challenge/response than IE offers. Macromedia's Flash is a good example.
IE: just visit and click > BAM! installed.
Others: Visit the site, download, install, restart browser.
Netscape and Mozilla even have a plugin install page. You can see what plugins that are installed by clicking Help > About Plug-ins
Plug-ins on IE> Tools > Options > General/Settings > View Objects. (Too Many Steps)
Of course, web browsers are a personal choice. I stopped using IE when I got Gatored, Comet Cursored, and require 3rd party software for popups and ad-awares.

Bottom Line: just be cautious of installing any free software taken from a website. Read your Eulas

 

[Grenage]

My personal opinion.

While I do not use IE:

IE is not the cause of the problem it is the victim, being the most popular browser it's the obvious target. THe few times I have machines where IE was the primary browser I didnt not have any ad problems, because I didn't have kazaa or any other similar programs installed. I still got the popups on websites though, but thats down to the website not the browser.