At 11:09 PM 04/21/2000, Carol C-H wrote: *************START OF ORIGINAL MESSAGE TEXT************* I don't know anything about alladvantage, but did download Optout the other day and it found 18 of those things on my computer and removed them. Is that "normal"? Where do they come from? Is someone trying to see where I go to hunt for ancestors? If so, reckon they would help me find them???? Carol (snip) **************END OF ORIGINAL MESSAGE TEXT************** Hello All. Just a note for any new subscribers to this VIRUS-DISCUSSION Mailing List. Although some of the posts seen here may not seem to be "Virus-related", they are, nonetheless, in the same category as "trojans", "worms", etc. The most recent subject has been those hidden applications that harvest information from our systems, and send the data to various organizations that use the demographic data for creating the CDs that Mass Mailers use, or that Telemarketers use. OptOut is a utility/application that, once installed and stays "memory resident", finds, at each Windows re-boot, files on our systems that are put there by the Aureate/Radiate company, and that finds Registry entries made by the same company. The Aureate/Radiate company "claims" that it is neither doing anything wrong, or that is "bad business practice". What is happening, in fact, is that Aureate/Radiate has made "deals" with many software producers to include the Aureate "hidden" application in their programs. When you install a software program that has made such a "deal", behind the scenes, unbeknownst to you, the installation process also installs Aureate. When you use one of the programs that has made the "deal", Aureate is searching through your system and gathering demographic data on your Net/Web usage, and sending the data directly to Aureate. Supposedly, the information gathered is restricted to such data as to which web sites you have visited, how often, how long you stayed at those web sites, what you clicked on, what "Ads" you "visited", what you ordered, what you bought, etc., etc. There is SUPPOSED to be no information to identify you, your email address, your postal address, etc.; however, some "hackers" have been able to access the Aureate site and actually find THEIR data, complete with name, address, email address, and so on. This is really scary! To answer Carol's question: "Where do they come from? Is someone trying to see where I go to hunt for ancestors? If so, reckon they would help me find them????" Carol, they are trying to see where you go to hunt for ANYTHING! Not just genealogy data! And, another scary thing is that, not only do such applications search your system for data, using the "pull" technology, they also attempt to SEND things to your system, using the "push" technology. If you also have ZoneAlarm, or any other "Personal Firewall", installed on your system, you can see how often these mercenary companies attempt to access your system, and, sometimes, even to access your BIOS!!!!! This is BEYOND scary! If someone can "backtrack" into your system when your modem is connected, and get to your BIOS, they can do ANYTHING to your system! Not that we've found any that do this, yet, but the possibility is there. Using ZoneAlarm, I HAVE had a few "hits" that tell me so-and-so IP is trying to access my BIOS. 'Nuff of that. Now to something I just tried out, in the line of protecting your system from unwanted access. I've bragged on ZoneAlarm, mainly because it is FREE, and because it is fairly simple to use. Yesterday, I received a notice from McAfee about their "Personal FireWall". Never making recommendations without having tried out a product, I paid the fee to install the "Firewall". (For current users of McAfee's "Clinic", the price for the FireWall is $19.95, as opposed to the normal $39.95 price.) Here are my comments on McAfee's Personal FireWall: 1) It costs you $19.95; 2) It does, basically, the same thing that the FREE ZoneAlarm does; 3) It doesn't have the depth of options that does ZoneAlarm; 4) But, it seems that you don't need to make all those individual option adjustments, since the McAfee FireWall does it all for you; 5) McAfee FireWall, so far, has caused absolutely NO conflicts on my system as ZoneAlarm sometimes does; 6) Until I have used the McAfee Personal FireWall for a few weeks, I won't make any recommendations. Just be aware that the "push" and "pull" technology now available acts almost EXACTLY as some viruses, trojans, and worms acts. If you don't have the proper protection, your system is very vulnerable! It doesn't matter if you click on the HAPPY-99.EXE link in an email, or if you are attacked by an information gatherer, your system is still being manipulated by outside forces! My final advice? Download the FREE OptOut application and get rid of all those Aureate files and Registry entries on your system. The only harm that will result from this is harm to Aureate, in that they will no longer receive secret data from your system. Download SOME kind of Firewall, whether it's the free ZoneAlarm, or something like the McAfee Personal Firewall. Norton also has such a Firewall built into their 2000 series of utilities. JUST PROTECT YOURSELVES! 'Til next time, SgtGeorge George W. Durman Knoxville, TN VIRUS-DISCUSSION List Administrator