Another Adware Company Claims It's Cleaning Up Its Act; Evidence Suggests Not
Entertainment Industry Redefines Organized Crime To Its Liking

Spyware Is The Stuff From Star Wars?

Studies

from the yes,-let-me-get-my-light-saber... dept

Fri, Aug 19th 2005 3:04am — Mike Masnick
It would appears that there's still something of an uphill battle in getting computer and internet users to understand the risks posed by online security threats like viruses and spyware. Only 8% were concerned about spyware -- even if 16% used spyware checkers on their personal computers (30% when you add in corporate users). However, at the other end of the spectrum, apparently 11% of people surveyed believed adware was a "gadget from Star Wars." I'm really hoping that 11% of the people taking this survey (sponsored by a security company, of course, so take any results with the required large grain of salt) were simply trying to muck up the results with silly answers. Also, that 8% figure seems odd, when double that number used spyware checkers. If anything, it certainly sounds like this study could have used confusing and/or misleading survey questions designed to elicit a specific response.
Hide this

Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.

Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.

While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.

–The Techdirt Team

16 Comments

If you liked this post, you may also be interested in...

Reader Comments

Subscribe: RSS

View by: Time | Thread


  • identicon
    dorpus, 19 Aug 2005 @ 4:48am

    Is Mozilla Spyware?

    My girlfriend just bought a laptop, and it won't let her install firefox. Won't let her remove the "Sign up Free for AOL Now!" software that came with it either -- and her account has administrator privileges. I tried rebooting in safe mode, logging in as "administrator", same story. Tried to wipe the operating system, wouldn't let me do that either. There seems to be some new secure version of windows that won't let administrators do anything?

    [ link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      dorpus, 19 Aug 2005 @ 4:50am

      Re: Is Mozilla Spyware?

      I took the laptop to work, had sysadmins look at it, and they were stumped too. One of them even had a master's degree, but didn't know what to make of it.

      [ link to this | view in chronology ]

      • identicon
        greg, 19 Aug 2005 @ 6:01am

        Re: Is Mozilla Spyware?

        You might want to check permissions. Some spyware lowers administrator permissions.

        [ link to this | view in chronology ]

      • identicon
        John, 19 Aug 2005 @ 6:16am

        Re: Is Mozilla Spyware?

        I see two possibilities, given that you are already trying to format & reinstall the OS:
        1. Download a low-level format utility from the manufacturer of the laptop's hard drive. While I have not had a laptop before, the utilities I have downloaded for my desktop have worked very well in some circumstances where a normal format (ie - clearing the disk partitions) has not worked. You may then reinstall the OS and applications that you see fit.
        2. Return the laptop as "defective". Clearly explain why you consider it to be defective. I am not going to make any assumptions that the laptop's behavior was intentional on the companies part, but even if it was then losing sales as a result could make the company change it's behavior.
        I hope you can get things sorted out.

        [ link to this | view in chronology ]

        • identicon
          dorpus, 19 Aug 2005 @ 6:28am

          Re: Is Mozilla Spyware?

          Ok, this laptop is as-is from the manufacturer (Sharp). Japanese companies don't provide utilities like that, and consumers cannot return items unless they are "defective" by the maker's definition. I'll try, but I'm not too hopeful.


          [ link to this | view in chronology ]

          • identicon
            Anonymous Coward, 19 Aug 2005 @ 8:19am

            Re: Is Mozilla Spyware?

            Bu y a new hard drive and reinstall from retail version of XP

            [ link to this | view in chronology ]

          • identicon
            Brice, 19 Aug 2005 @ 8:33am

            Re: Is Mozilla Spyware?

            Will the laptop let you boot to floppy or cd-rom? Can you change the device it boots to in BIOS (press F2 or Ctrl-Alt-S before Windows starts booting)? If so, you can download a bootable cd-rom/floppy image (e.g. from bootdisk.com) and use that to wipe your drive clean and then buy a copy of Windows and install it (don't use the disk that came with the laptop--that will probably just put the system back into the original state).
            If BIOS won't let you boot to a floppy/CD-Rom, then take it to a place that specializes in laptop repair and tell them what you want to do. Chances are, they know how to work around it. If you're tech savvy, they might even tell you how to do it for no charge.

            [ link to this | view in chronology ]

        • identicon
          Secret Squirrel, 19 Aug 2005 @ 8:18am

          Re: Is Mozilla Spyware?

          After you ensure you copy off everything you/she saved to it, you don't need to low-level anything. Reboot with an original XP disk and re-install the whole OS, it will be handy to have all drivers on a CD onhand before you get started.

          [ link to this | view in chronology ]

          • identicon
            dorpus, 19 Aug 2005 @ 8:21am

            Re: Is Mozilla Spyware?

            I tried to re-install with original XP disks, but it gives me a message about how the OS on the laptop is newer, therefore it will not rebuild. I tried following complicated instructions for performing a "local" build by copying CD contents onto the hard drive, as well as downloading the SP2 patch and "integrating" it, but I still got the same error.

            Otherwise, I would just have to rebuild with the laptop OS disk, which has all the extra "free AOL!" crap on it, and doesn't accomplish anything.

            [ link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      michael, 19 Aug 2005 @ 8:52am

      Re: Is Mozilla Spyware?

      Is this legal at all to not allow you remove the aol software and not letting you install firefox? You can probably sue them for this.

      [ link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      Jeff, 19 Aug 2005 @ 9:08am

      Re: Is Mozilla Spyware?

      Simple fix. Get a copy of Linux and boot it that. If your girlfriend was stupid enough to buy something with Windows on it, then this is the answer. Otherwise, take it back and buy a Mac.

      [ link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      Melvin, 19 Aug 2005 @ 9:21am

      Re: Is Mozilla Spyware?

      you can download a little program called "delpart" http://www.juliatexas.com/delpart/delpart.exe Just copy this file to a bootable floppy and run it. This program will allow you to delete just about any type of partition

      [ link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      zaphar, 19 Aug 2005 @ 9:54am

      Re: Is Mozilla Spyware?

      I'm guessing there is some kind of hard drive sherrif on the laptop. Especially since it won't let you wipe the operating system. In that Case a lowlevel format is your only option. You might have to delete the partitions and rebuild the MBR make sure there aren't any hidden partitions that an image might be sitting on. You can do this using a dos boot disk or win98 bootable cd. Then reinstall the OS from CD. It's best to use a full install CD not one that came from the laptop manufacturer.

      [ link to this | view in chronology ]

      • identicon
        Ivan Sick, 19 Aug 2005 @ 10:11am

        Re: Is Mozilla Spyware?

        Holy smokes, dorpus has actually successfully 100% hijacked a thread. Well to jump into the current discussion, it doesn't sound like, from what he's said, he has actually tried to wipe the hard drive.

        [ link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      ME, 13 Nov 2005 @ 4:13pm

      Re: Is Mozilla Spyware?

      Welcome to the world of Windows Palladium (longhorn). The legal OS to hijack your system, and tell you what you software can be installed, how long you can to listen to various mp3s, and search and delete pirated software, mp3s, etc. from your computer.
      Bill's first goal, lock out open source. Bill's second goal, lock in customers.
      Check these sites out. Or search for Palladium, Longhorn, or TCP (trustworthy computing platform)
      http://www.iscnetwork.com/winblows/Palladium.htm
      http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/~rja14/tcpa-faq.htm l
      http://www.oilempire.us/microsoft.html
      http://home.arcor.de/andi.mohr/darkage.html

      [ link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Freedster, 19 Aug 2005 @ 8:19am

    No Subject Given

    Boot to a Win98 floppy, (download one here: http://www.answersthatwork.com/Downright_pages/downrights_bootdisks.htm) delete and recreate the partitions, and then format them with a /u paramater before you reinstall Windoze.

    - Freed

    [ link to this | view in chronology ]


Another Adware Company Claims It's Cleaning Up Its Act; Evidence Suggests Not
Entertainment Industry Redefines Organized Crime To Its Liking
Follow Techdirt
Essential Reading
Techdirt Deals
Report this ad  |  Hide Techdirt ads
Techdirt Insider Discord

The latest chatter on the Techdirt Insider Discord channel...

Loading...
Recent Stories

Friday

19:39 Important Announcement: Techdirt Is Migrating To A New Platform (0)
More arrow

This site, like most other sites on the web, uses cookies. For more information, see our privacy policy. Got it
Close

Email This

This feature is only available to registered users. Register or sign in to use it.