Neuron Computer Services Blog

What is Spyware?

Spyware/adware, herein referred to as spyware, is software that covertly gathers user information through the user’s Internet connection. This occurs with or without his or her knowledge, usually for advertising purposes. Spyware applications are typically bundled as a hidden component of freeware or shareware programs that can be downloaded from the Internet; however, it should be noted that the majority of shareware and freeware applications do not come with spyware.

Unlike viruses and worms, spyware does not usually self-replicate. Like many recent viruses, however, spyware exploits infected computers for commercial gain. Typical tactics furthering this goal include delivery of unsolicited pop-up advertisements; theft of personal information, including financial information such as credit card numbers; monitoring of Web-browsing activity for marketing purposes; or routing of HTTP requests to advertising sites.

Spyware does not directly spread in the manner of a computer virus or worm. Generally, an infected system does not attempt to transmit the infection to other computers. Instead, spyware gets on a system through deception of the user or through exploitation of software vulnerabilities.

Most spyware is installed without users being aware. Since they tend not to install software if they know that it will disrupt their working environment and compromise their privacy, spyware deceives users, either by piggybacking on a piece of desirable software such as a free screen saver, or tricking them into installing it. Some “rogue” spyware programs even masquerade as anti-spyware software, and actually install the spyware they detect and offer to remove, for a price.

The distributor of spyware usually presents the program as a useful utility, e.g.: as a “Web accelerator” or as a helpful software agent. Users download and install the software without immediately suspecting that it could cause harm. For example, Bonzi Buddy, a spyware program targeted at children, claims that:

He will explore the Internet with you as your very own friend and sidekick! He can talk, walk, joke, browse, search, e-mail, and download like no other friend you’ve ever had! He even has the ability to compare prices on the products you love and help you save money! Best of all, he’s FREE!

Once installed, spyware can monitor user activity on the Internet and transmits that information in the background to someone else. Spyware can also gather information about e-mail addresses and even passwords and credit card numbers.

Spyware is similar to a Trojan horse in that users unwittingly install the product when they install something else. A common way to become a victim of spyware is to download certain peer-to-peer file swapping products that are available today. Spyware can infest the computer turning it into a “zombie” that will spoof email usernames and send spam to other computers without the user’s knowledge.

This will usually only occur on a computer with an “Always On” broadband connection since the dialup process can be easily detected by the user. If using a dialup connection, an indication that the computer has active spyware running is its constant attempts to dialup the internet connection. Another good indicator of a computer being infected with spyware is an extended boot up time. Since spyware is designed to do many of its dirty deeds undetected, there will be no reference to it in the system taskbar, or in the Add or Remove Programs dialog.

Aside from the questions of ethics, privacy and it being illegal, spyware steals from the user by using the computer’s memory resources and also by eating bandwidth as it sends information back to the spyware’s home base via the user’s Internet connection. Because spyware is using memory and system resources, it can lead to system crashes or general system instability. Spyware can get so resource consuming that it becomes impossible to use the computer.

Spyware exists as independent executable programs, and therefore has the ability to monitor keystrokes, scan files on the hard drive, snoop other applications such as chat programs or word processors, install other spyware programs, read cookies, change the default home page on the Web browser, and consistently relay this information back to the spyware author who will either use it for advertising or marketing purposes or sell the information to another party.

Licensing agreements that accompany software downloads sometimes warn the user that a spyware program will be installed along with the requested software, but the licensing agreements may not always be read completely because the notice of a spyware installation is often couched in obtuse, hard-to-read legal disclaimers.

Some likely sites that may try to push this spyware to you include free greeting cards, free games, free game cheat codes, free screen savers, free anything, etc. If the site is offering something for free, check it closely, very closely and be absolutely certain of the sites trustworthiness.

Even if all they ask for is your email address, it is entirely possible that they will be selling your address to spammers. This is one place where this old adage really applies, “If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is”.

Windows 7 Official Release Date Announced

Yesterday, I posted a blog entry and sent out a newsletter that discussed Windows 7 and speculated that it would be released sometime this fall. Well, turns out my speculation was spot-on, as today, Microsoft has officially announced the release date to be October 22nd, 2009. This date is 3 months ahead of schedule and puts it out just in time for the holiday season. Find out more here.

Finally, A Replacement for Vista and XP

It looks like Windows 7 is coming out very soon! Microsoft released the Release Candidate of Windows 7 last month and usually when they do this, the final release comes out 3-5 months later. I downloaded and installed the Release Candidate for Windows 7, which is publicly available to anyone who wishes to try it out (I do not recommend doing so on production computers).

The download should be available until at least June 2009. The software, however, is time-bomb trial-ware which will disable itself on June 1, 2010.

I installed it on my main desktop computer onto a secondary partition and configured it in such a way that it dual boots both my primary/production Vista OS and my Windows 7 Release Candidate OS. I have been playing around with it for about 2 weeks off and on. I can say that this new operating system will finally be a replacement for Windows Vista and Windows XP. I can tell the difference in performance and usability, even on the same machine, when doing similar tasks in both Vista and 7. It is stable, solid, clean, and feels very fast.  It uses a lot less hardware resources than Vista or even XP and puts all the computing power at the forefront for the user’s disposal rather than using it all up for its own thing. It resembles Vista a bit, and was built on the Vista core, but feels less flashy and more modest.  Applications that run on Vista should run on Windows 7, and hardware that runs Vista will run Windows 7. There are also several compatibility options for Windows XP-era applications as well.

One of the goals of Microsoft was to improve the performance from Vista, and they have addressed this by both increasing the speed of the OS and by developing features that help the user operate more efficiently.
Overall, Microsoft worked on providing a fundamentally secure platform, helping secure anywhere access, protecting users and infrastructure, and helping protect data.

There are many new features to explore, but here is a quick bullet point list of some of the highlights:

• Improved desktop search
• Internet Explorer 8 for improved Internet security
• DirectAccess (automatically connect remote workstations to Windows Server 2008)
• BranchCache (used to sync files between corporate and branch offices)
• Improved BitLocker (drive encryption)
• BitLocker To Go (encrypt portable devices such as USB keys)
• Built-in Biometric support
• Improved taskbar
• Improved device management
• Better compatibility for both hardware and software
• Windows Touch (for touch screen enabled monitors)
• Tight integration with Windows Live online services
• Remote media streaming
• PlayTo
• Windows Media Center improvements

Before the Release Candidate was released, Microsoft fixed over 2,000 bugs that were reported by beta testers (including me). With the success of the Release Candidate, I have already decided that I will be upgrading to Windows 7 on both my production workstation and my laptop as soon as it comes to market. I’m not even worried about application compatibility or hardware compatibility as all of my applications already work fine in the RC and anything that runs in Vista should run in Windows 7 with no problems. My computers will feel like new computers again with the performance, reliability, stability, security enhancements that Windows 7 offers over XP or Vista.

Additional Microsoft Resources

Videos: http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windows-7/videos.aspx
Windows 7 Home: http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windows-7/default.aspx
New Features: http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windows-7/whats-new.aspx

What exactly is computer memory?

Most computer users are confused between the two types of computer memory. There is the one type of memory that if you increase it’s capacity, you get a dramatic performance boost. Then there is the other type of memory where if you increase that capacity, you get to store a lot more music, photos, videos, and the like. I sometimes get questions like “Will adding all of my photos from my camera onto my computer slow it down?” The answer to that question is no and I will explain why below.

There are two types of computer “memory”. There is RAM (or Random Access Memory) of which the operating system and programs you see on your computer’s screen resides in and there is hard disk drive storage memory. RAM is the “fast” type of memory. This memory works so fast that its speed is measured in nanoseconds. Hard disk drives are the “slow” type of memory. This memory is so slow that its speed is measured in milliseconds. Hard disk drive storage is in the hundreds of gigabytes and it is a permanent storage medium for all your computer’s data (operating system, pictures, music, documents, etc). This type of memory should be thought of as “storage” rather than “memory” because that’s where the terminology can get confusing for some users. The real type of computer “memory” is RAM and it’s the kind that runs all of your programs in real-time until you turn off your computer. That’s why computers take a long time to boot up because it has to pull all the programs off the slow hard disk drive back into fast RAM before you’re able to work on the computer. RAM is volatile memory – all your stuff disappears as soon as the power is turned off.

Now here’s where things get interesting. If you try to load so many programs at once to multitask in, or play a very resource intensive game, database application, or CAD type of program, your computer might actually run out of its fast RAM type of memory. Then guess what happens? It has to use the slower hard drive for additional memory! This is called paging or swapping. It will take those unused running applications that are usually in the background or minimized on your task bar and put those onto the hard disk drive in order to free up RAM for the newly launched application. This is why one of the BEST things you can do to speed up your computer is to add more RAM. For Windows XP, I recommend no less than 2 gigabytes of RAM for today’s common applications. For Windows Vista, I recommend no less than 4 gigabytes of RAM. For the upcoming Windows 7, we will be able to run a very efficient computer with only 2 gigabytes of memory again, just like Windows XP, because Microsoft has really scaled back all the “bloat” that plagues Vista.

So, if you find that launching multiple windows on your screen is very slow, then you just might need a RAM upgrade. Feel free to contact me for a free evaluation of your computer and its RAM upgradeability.

Blog Updated – Look and Feel Changed

As you may notice, I have finally changed the look and feel of this blog. I was using the default WordPress theme, which is quite nice and simple, but way too saturated. Many freshly installed blogs on the Internet usually have this theme and I managed to get away with it for over a year. I finally came across a decent theme, though not perfect, and applied it to this blog. WordPress is so incredibly easy. It took mere seconds to download, upload the theme to my blog, then activate it. Way too easy. Loving technology!

Is Your Computer Obsolete?

A few years ago, I saw a cartoon of a guy proudly driving home with his brand new state-of-the-art 386 computer in the back seat. In the background was a huge billboard advertising the 486. The message: his computer was obsolete before he even got it home.

Technology is always changing… it’s hard to be sure if the system you have will support the newest software and peripherals. So how do you know when it is indeed time to buy a new computer, or when it is best to ignore the commercials that tout the latest “gotta-have” technology?

You May Need To Buy A New Computer If…

…your processor speed is less than 1.0 gigahertz (GHz). Most operating systems and application software these days demand a lot from your system. A speedy processor will help you browse the Internet, run your word processor and play games with ease. On a Windows PC, click the Start button, then Control Panel, then System to see your processor information. If the speed is listed in megahertz instead of gigahertz, see if any friends need a new anchor for their fishing boat.

…your computer has less than 512 megabytes (MB) of RAM memory. Again, the System Properties window will show how much RAM is installed. I recommend at least 1GB (1000MB) of RAM for smooth and speedy performance. Go for 2GB of RAM if you’re running Vista.

…you are running a version of Windows that begins with a “3? or a “9? (Windows 3.1, Win95, or Win98). These versions lack the security features and technological advances required for safe computing and protection from identity theft. If you have a Mac that’s NOT running OS X, the same applies.

…you have a monitor that’s 15-inch or smaller, or worse, is a CRT. Most websites will not display properly on an old 15-inch monitor, and the larger 17-inch models are now standard. (I have dual 24-inch widescreen LCD monitors on my desk!). Save on the environment and energy bill with a new LCD monitor.

…you try to install a program and you get the error “Operating System not supported.”

…you try to upgrade the Operating System and get an error message that the hardware is not supported.

…your computer has no USB ports. Most peripheral devices such as the mouse, keyboard, printer, scanner and external hard drives now use USB connections.

…your computer has a 3.5 inch floppy disk drive! Software has outgrown the floppy disk, and the mere presence of a floppy drive on your machine may indicate that it’s time to recycle it.

All of the above scenarios warrant shelling out the dough for a new computer. There are cases however, where you might have a relatively new computer, (less than 3 years old) and it is acting up enough to make you want to replace it with a new one. Before you do that, let’s look at a few ways you can “soup up” a fairly new machine:

Your Computer Is Running S-l-o-o-o-w-w

This is probably the number one complaint I receive from users on a regular basis. If your computer is less than 3 years old, there are a myriad of reasons for the slowdown in performance. For instance, you may not have all the latest security software installed. Operating Systems, device drivers, anti-virus programs and other applications have frequent updates releases to their original product. Keeping up with the latest releases or patches of any software you are running, is a good way to keep your computer free from viruses and spyware that can slow it to a crawl.

Sometimes a slow running computer is one that is lacking memory. As applications get more feature rich, more memory (RAM, not hard drive space) is required to run them. A lot of times, computers will be sold or built without the maximum capacity of RAM that they can actually run. I can scan your computer for you and find out how much RAM you currently have installed as well as the maximum RAM you can have along with the type. Upgrading RAM is a very inexpensive way to speed up your computer and extend the life of it. I highly recommend it for any XP computer that has less than 1 GB or any Vista computer that has less than 2 GB.

Your Computer Is Running Out of Space

You are noticing degradation in your computer’s performance, and you are also noticing “Running low on disk space” messages. Low disk space can slow a machine down, and also cause problems running applications. Hard drive space is getting cheaper and cheaper these days; the newest computers often come with 500GB (or larger) hard drives as a standard. You don’t have to buy one of these new computers though; you can replace a smaller hard disk drive with a larger one, or add a second hard.

It’s important to know when to let go of an old clunker of a computer. It’s just as important to realize when your computer needs a “tune-up”. The goal is to find a happy medium between being able to experience the latest that technology has to offer, but not being pressured into throwing a perfectly good system away because of slick sales ads, feature envy or industry hype.

If you need advice on whether or not your computer needs a tune-up, a memory upgrade, a hard drive upgrade, or that you need a new computer altogether, don’t hesitate to contact me today. I give FREE assessments and consultations, and this can be done quickly and easily via remote support services.

Why free music is bad for your computer

The music itself is not bad for your computer, actually. However, the means and methods of getting free music, or free anything, can be bad for your computer. A lot of the free stuff comes with a catch in a nicely packaged form of a Trojan. These Trojans are malicious computer programs that hook themselves into your operating system and then phone home to download more junk in the background – or worse, spy on you and send your personal information to their masters. For those of you who have experienced pop-ups, fake anti-virus alerts, or stuff that wants you to buy something, may have actually experienced the effects of sophisticated Trojans. If you go online and do a Google search for “free music”, you’re more likely to come across a malicious website than if you were to search for “buy music”.

Several ways of getting free music, and free stuff in general are via peer 2 peer (p2p) networks. One popular client is called Limewire. This free program gives you access to a network of thousands of free songs. This free program also gives you access to the same networks that virus writers like to upload their programs to lure people into downloading and running them. The files they upload are named in such a way that anyone searching for their favorite artist or song will be misled into downloading a Trojan that masquerades itself as a song. The virus authors do this because they make tons of cash selling ads or products to unsuspecting users. In fact, one guy in Arizona was raided by the FBI because he was a suspected virus author and spammer that made millions. They found hundreds of thousands of dollars in cash stuffed in cereal boxes throughout his house, as well as a yellow Lamborghini parked on his driveway. This guy made his millions off unsuspecting Limewire users and by sending billions of spam messages per day.

So,  while Limewire as a program itself is not malicious in any way, the large peer 2 peer network that it connects to is a haven for malicious software. It does have tons of free music available but some of the music does masquerade as a virus. The best thing you can do if you must use Limewire is to make sure that you have an up-to-date operating system, the latest and greatest anti-virus engine, and the know-how on what to look for and how to avoid getting your system infected.

Terminal Services Easy Print “Access is Denied” Event ID 6161

Well, well, well. After about 2.5 hours of hardcore troubleshooting, Googling, and Microsoft Forum browsing, I was finally able to get Terminal Services Easy Print to print to my Dell printer. Here’s my scenario:

TS: Windows Server 2008 Standard, x64 with . NET Framework 3.0 SP1 installed (pre-reqs for Easy Print).
Client: Windows Vista Ultimate x64 SP1 with .NET Framework 3.5 and TS Client 6.1 installed (also pre-reqs for Easy Print).

Connecting to the Terminal Server showed the redirected printers just fine. I was even able to get into the Printer Preferences and have it show settings. This part gave me an error message of “Printer settings could not be saved. This operation is not supported”, however. Even after doing the fix, it still does it so I’m stuck on having defaults when printing stuff out (NOT GOOD when it comes to QuickBooks check printing). Hopefully I can fix that issue.

Print test pages seemed to work as far as clicking on “Print Test Page” and having it say “A test page has been sent to the printer…” However, nothing came out of my local printer. Further investigation revealed the following Event Log error ID 6161:

“The document Test Page, owned by Administrator, failed to print on printer Dell 3110cn (redirected 2). Try to print the document again, or restart the print spooler.
Data type: RAW. Size of the spool file in bytes: 133576. Number of bytes printed: 0. Total number of pages in the document: 1. Number of pages printed: 0. Client computer: \\SOMA. Win32 error code returned by the print processor: 5. Access is denied.”

As you can see, it says “Access is denied”. I drilled into this issue further and discovered that by going to the Security tab of the redirected printer in question revealed that the user did not even have any permission whatsoever to print to the print. All the boxes were grayed out and unchecked. So I figured out that it was definitely some kind of permissions issue. Either the TS server was blocking access or my local Vista machine was. Googling upon this turned up an ExpertsExchange discussion on this same issue. The fix?

Give write/modify permissions to the Domain Users group on c:\windows\system32\spool folder on the TS server.

This got it working and things print out no problem now. Now all I have to do is figure out why I can’t edit the printer preferences. “Easy Print”? Yeah right.

Information Privacy and Encryption

Pretty much anyone who has dealt with ordering goods and services online or doing online banking has heard of encryption. But what exactly is it and how important is it really?

I would say it is absolutely crucial that any personal information being transmitted online be encrypted to the highest level possible. Modern web browsers such as Mozilla FireFox or Internet Explorer have good encryption and do a good job in letting you know if you’re about to send personally identifiable information to a third party. You should always look out for the yellow lock icon whenever you’re about to send a password, address, or other personally identifiable information. Anything less, you should avoid doing so.

Encryption does not end at web browsing and using services on the Internet, however. It’s also important to have strong encryption for your home or office wireless network. The most common type is WEP, which unfortunately, is not as secure as originally thought. With the right tool, it can be hacked in less than a minute. I recommend at least WPA encryption security, or WPA2 if your wireless router and laptop support it.

A growing trend in data privacy and security is the encryption of storage media such as the hard disk drive or even flash drives. I use a Lexar JumpDrive, which can be configured to have an encrypted, password-protected volume. There is a new flash drive called the IronKey. It not only encrypts and protects your data with a hardware Cryptochip, it can also self-destruct. Should it get in the wrong hands, it will literally fry itself so the data cannot be recovered.

For encryption of your files on your computer, there is a non-profit organization called TrueCrypt that has developed a great, free software program. Their program, TrueCrypt, allows you to encrypt entire drives, folders, or individual files with ease.

Here are some quick tips for making sure your data is safe and protected:

• Make sure the yellow lock is on and visible whenever you send information via a form online.
• Make sure the website address is prefixed with an https:// instead of just plain http://. This denotes Secure Socket Layer (SSL) SSL security.
• If you need to transmit sensitive information or documents via e-mail, you really shouldn’t. Instead use fax, certified postal mail, or a secure file-sharing service such as ShareFile.com.
• Contact me if you have any concerns about the privacy of your sensitive data.

For a great article on on encryption, check out How Stuff Works. It is rather technical, but still offers insights on protecting your information online.

I lied in my Vista newsletter.

In my previous newsletter regarding my take on Windows Vista, I stated that I was going to wait until Windows 7 comes out in 2010 before building myself a new computer. Well, I went ahead and took the plunge!

Despite the fact that I was going to push my circa-2005 computer into a 5-year stretch, I decided that it was time to upgrade to a Windows Vista Ultimate 64-bit capable PC. The main reason in doing so is because I was getting tired of the pokey performance of my Intel Pentium 4 single-core 3GHz processor and limited motherboard capacity of 2 GB of RAM. This is especially evident when browsing media-rich websites like YouTube or a lot of tech-related websites I frequent. Those Flash ads and Flash videos really take a toll on older CPUs. Today’s software is simply more demanding, more “bloated”, and requires the latest hardware; especially dual or quad-core CPUs and tons of memory. With that said, let me introduce you to the computer I built for myself in October:

- Intel Quad-core Q9550 2.83GHz (that’s four 2.83GHz CPUs in one package).
- 8GB Memory
- Two extremely fast WD Raptor 150GB 10,000RPM hard drives in a RAID-1 mirror (this means that if one hard drive fails, I just put in a hot spare and it will rebuild with no data loss. It also means double the read speed for even faster Windows boot up time and program loading).
- Windows Vista Ultimate 64-bit edition. (I have started to recommend going with 64-bit Vista if you’re going to go with a Vista PC. The reason being is that Vista is extremely demanding of memory and with 32-bit versions, you’re limited to 3 to 3.5GB or so and cannot upgrade to anything higher. Most modern computers today can be upgraded to 8GB or more. I consider 4GB the bare minimum for Vista, and with memory prices so low, it’s actually affordable).
- nVidia GeForce 8800GT 512MB Video card. (Considered one of the best budget graphics cards you can buy today).

The computer I built myself scores a 5.9 in the Windows Experience Index benchmark.

So what is this Windows Experience Index score? It’s a rating system developed by Microsoft to benchmark your computer. A score of 5.9 is the highest score you can get currently. Microsoft has stated they may increase the maximum score in the near future, but for now, if you want the best Vista computer money can buy, make sure it scores 5.9 across the board. Anything less than 5.0 for a Vista desktop PC or 3.0 for a Vista laptop should probably get upgraded in RAM or video. If that’s not possible, then a new PC or a downgrade to XP would be ideal.

The best part of it all, is my computer will easily be able to handle Windows 7 when it comes out in late 2009 or early 2010 simply because of the fact that Microsoft is working hard to minimize the “bloat” in their operating system. They are refining the operating system kernel and calling it “MinWin”. This means faster boot times, faster program loads, and easier ways to work with the computer. The future is looking good for PCs.

By the way, I’m a PC!