Pop Up Hell For Windows Users?
From USA Today:
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Quote:
Last fall, hackers discovered that Windows messenger service will also accept pop-up boxes broadcast across the Internet. With a little help, advertisers can insert product pitches into such boxes and broadcast them to any Web-connected PC.
Last fall, hackers discovered that Windows messenger service will also accept pop-up boxes broadcast across the Internet. With a little help, advertisers can insert product pitches into such boxes and broadcast them to any Web-connected PC.
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Comments
Originally posted by MacsRGood4U
From USA Today:
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This is OLD news, I believe. Yes, it's bad, though. My fiancee's parents complained that they would get random pop-ups (through the messenger service) about every FIVE minutes while their computer was on! (This is, of course because they didn't like having a firewall on their system because it would alert them from time to time about something - it scared them.)
Go into MSConfig or the equivalent in XP and shut off the service. For some reason though I found that Windows Messenger Service(not to be confused with MSN Messenger) will sometimes re-enable.
Honestly I really don't like Windows. I'm severely dissapointed in the lack of security of this OS. My Mother tends to download things that jazz up the Interface or Email only to find them loading with Data Miners and Hijackers.
It amazes me that PC Universe only focuses on Speed and seemingly security for Corporations.
How many times do I have to remove flashtrack from my PC only to have it reinstalled by some rogue site or app.
It's not just viruses but complete computer malfeasance by Gates' Company. I'm disgusted with them.
Originally posted by Noleli2
Yes. It's terrible. I've seen a Windows machine get pop-ups when physically air-gapped from the network. Just amazing.
yes, its true. My work PC gets them constantly. I'm on a 15 day trial of some ad-popup-blocker thingie and in two day its blocked 404 pop-up messages.
When IE first came out I remember being extremely offended that they would allow their program to spawn new windows of itself without the users permission to do so... My how far we've come.
This is the service that allows you to receive system messages from various programs. you can disable it, but things you might need (such as virus alerts) also end up being disabled. Funny that the thing that's supposed to help you stay safe causes problems.
The spam, virii, patches and ads are absolutely crippling us at work. Our network is incredibly fragile, the main data servers, the intranet, the e-mail servers, the LAN and WAN are all buckling under the stress. It literally costs us tens of thousands of dollars each time some part of the system goes down due to lost time and productivity. I've been told to bill lost time to IT, so we can track these thing financially, and last week (a particularly bad week, however), it added up to about a day's worth of non-billable time. How much can people tolerate before they finally say enough is enough?!
Dave.
Originally posted by Dave Abrey
AFAIK, a firewall wil stop the Windows Messenger pop-up's. I'm on XP, and I have both a software firewall (Norton Internet Security) and a hardware one in the form of my router. When people started talking about this, I was thinking "What are these people talking about? Never seen one of those...", and to this day, I still haven't seen one 8). AS for regular pop-ups in IE, I recently discovered Mozilla Firebird, and will be using Safari wen I get my Mac.
Dave.
A firewall does stop them. But it also stops network messages. And that's something many places need.