KVR Audio

kritikon · Post by **kritikon** » Tue Aug 10, 2004 12:54 am

So I just spent a thrilling morning downloading and scanning with Spybot for some extra safety after I got hold of some bastard Advertising thing that wouldn't go away. ( I already use Adaware, but thought I'd go the whole hog) - just as well, because Spybot found a few nasties that Adaware didn't! Scanned with a few other things as well.

So anyway....the blurb with Spybot had some general tips. Amongst them was a recommendation to not use ActiveX, as there are all sorts of evil things that can hide there. I've done the standard things such as disabling Cookies etc, but it seems ActiveX is needed for some net stuff. I've no idea what it's all about - so can I disable all of the ActiveX stuff in net settings? Or will I then not be able to access stuff I need?

I use Norton Antivirus (older version) .... soon to upgrade to the latest. But should I (or can I) still disable ActiveX without f**king up stuff that I know precious little about?

Or am I just being paranoid. (but I'm soon to buy a whole heap of stuff over the net (which I rarely do) so it really bothers me that I'm maybe not doing everything to stop trackers etc.

(Spending a whole morning d/l'ing and reading about internet safety stuff is a real dismal way of unwinding.)
I think I prefer going to the dentist

uncadave · Post by **uncadave** » Tue Aug 10, 2004 1:30 am

i'm not a very good geek at this stuff, but i've been using norton 2004, ad-aware and spybot, all of which i keep updated meticulously. still got nailed with the nasty 'about blank' thing. so i've been using mozilla firefox, which i'm finding i like quite a bit...no activex, however many sites want you to install shockwave player or what have you, and some features are lost there. i'm cleaN, tho, so what the hell.

urk10 · Post by **urk10** » Tue Aug 10, 2004 3:25 am

You want:http://www.javacoolsoftware.com/spywareblaster.html

Prevent spyware from installing in the first place!

kritikon · Post by **kritikon** » Tue Aug 10, 2004 4:00 pm

Ta for the link....I'll check it out. So if I use the Lavacool jobbie, then I don't need to mess around with any ActiveX settings?

dvonae · Post by **dvonae** » Tue Aug 10, 2004 5:16 pm

PC Safety Tips:

These simple rules/tips have served me well for years. Some of this will seem elementary, but the ease with which recent worms and viruses have spread would indicate that many people don't follow these tips...

Use Mozilla for all normal browsing (or any browser that does not require Internet Explorer's core files) -- besides, tabbed browsing is so much easier than one window for each page...
Internet Explorer only for Microsoft Updates and the occassional brain-dead banking site
Up-to-date anti-virus (I use AVG)
Periodically run Spybot and Adaware
Remember childhood rule -- "if it sounds to good to be true..." -- when contemplating downloads of expensive software for "free"
Pay attention to warning messages and actually read them -- just because nothing bad has happened clicking 'OK' on that security dialog box for the past 100 times doesn't mean that the 101st won't be the nasty one...
Back up your important data -- to a CD/DVD, Tape, a second computer, it doesn't matter, just do it
Back up your important data

Oh, and one last thing... Back up your important data...

--
-=>( DVonae )<=-

kritikon · Post by **kritikon** » Tue Aug 10, 2004 9:25 pm

That's good advice. I must admit I'm probably a bit slack at backing up.....I tend to do that only when I have a CD's worth of stuff to save. I really should get into the habit of using CDRWs regularly for inbetween backups.

Must check out Mozilla and a few other browsers too.

dvonae · Post by **dvonae** » Tue Aug 10, 2004 10:11 pm

kritikon wrote:That's good advice. I must admit I'm probably a bit slack at backing up.....I tend to do that only when I have a CD's worth of stuff to save. I really should get into the habit of using CDRWs regularly for inbetween backups.

I try to keep critical stuff on multiple machines, but that's not as good as burning to CD. I try to follow my own advice about backups, but I'm no better than most -- I don't back up as often as I should.

Must check out Mozilla and a few other browsers too.

Mozilla's a browser, email client, news client, web editor and chat client. If you only need the browser, you might want to check out Mozilla's FireFox, which is just a browser.

LBN · Post by **LBN** » Tue Aug 10, 2004 10:41 pm

I second (or third?) the recommendation of ditching Internet Explorer/Outlook [Express] and switching to Mozilla Firefox for browsing and Mozilla Thunderbird for email. After getting hit with the download.ject exploit about a month ago I did a fresh install, locked down IE/OE, and installed Firefox and Thunderbird. The transition is painless because both programs import all of your settings, bookmarks, addresses, etc. And Firefox's extensions add great functionality to it that IE will never have. I personally recommend Adblock and Tabbrowser Extensions to have the coolest browsing experience available.

No more spyware headaches. No more pop-ups. No more trojans. No more dialers. No more CoolWWWSearch.

ActiveX or not ActiveX ?