Out of curiosity, why do you sign your post as Microsoft
yet use an AOL account as your email address? I would
assume that you wanted to attract my attention by using
misdirection - you want something so you use a "less than
ethical" method to accomplish it.
Welcome to spyware - you're a trainee extraordinaire!
I'm going to explain something in very basic layman's terms
because I so often see confusion when people attempt to
discuss a problem with their computers.
A virus is something on your computer that generally is
there for the sole purpose of causing damage on some level
to a computer.
A trojan is something on your computer that allows another
person in a remote location to gain access (and possibly
control of) to your computer without your knowledge.
Spyware is a program that "watches" what you are doing and
executes "something" based upon either your actions or the
website you are visiting.
Just so you know, when I created my software, I didn't call
it spyware - I called in Intelliware.
If you have kept up with advertising on the internet over
the last 4-5 years, you've watched an incredible change in
both the cost of the ads as well as the conversion ratio's
of those ads.
I won't go into all of the details of that - it's just as
easily explained and you can keep up with the story by
knowing they've both dropped like a rock.
If Company A wants to advertise their wares to online
consumers they are limited to 3 main avenues:
- A placement in a search engine where they compete against
other companies offering the same/similar wares and have
placements in the same search engine for the same keywords
- Buying advertising on a website
- Having an affiliate program where they share profits to
individuals/companies that bring in sales
I wanted to be able to provide companies a way to talk to
their customers without limitations based upon what site
the customers were currently viewing - meaning that if
company A had bought advertising on website A,B and C and
had affiliates showing their advertisements on websites D -
T, there was no system in place to communicate with the
customer if they were on website U-Z because those websites
are not affiliates of Company A nor has Company A purchased
advertising space on their site. Factor in the fact that
very few websites only show 1 advertisement on their page
then you begin to understand how/why advertising
rates/conversions have dropped like a rock.
I wanted to change that - and, I did.
If a customer was on Site A doing a search for a book - I
could offer Site B a way to talk to the customer before
they made a purchase - but that wasn't good enough for me.
I wanted to know exactly what book the customer was
interested in. If you're going to talk to a customer - it
helps to know the exact subject they're currently
interested in.
So, when they do that search a book on Site A and Site A
gives the customer the results (as well as the price of
that book) - I could communicate with the customer by
telling them that Site B sells that same book for less.
Site A has spent countless dollars advertising their
company across thousands of websites as well as print
media. Site B only has to pay me a commission for the sale.
Which company do you think is going to have the higher
profit margin?
Now you can begin to understand why so many company's
purchase advertising on spyware.
That's just 1 example of the features I incorporated into
my software but you can see where I took this.
A couple of things to know about me - I didn't stealth
install my Intelliware onto computers and it came with a
EULA that told the customer exactly what I would do. I
didn't data mine the customer for any personal information.
I could care less who was using my software or where they
were from on a personal level. I could - but I didn't.
That's not to say I didn't know how or how others do
accomplish it - it's just (and believe me or not) an
ethical line I'm not willing to cross. I'm also a firm
believer that you don't make much money from angry
customers. If you wanted to uninstall my software - I let you.
Now, back to your question Ralph - "but I would wonder what
percentage of spyware is advertising, and what percentage
is simply malicious?"
The short answer is 95% advertising - 5% malicious. It's a
big world and you never have to travel very far to find
someone who's true intent is harmful in nature.
The long answer is much more complicated than that. You
have spyware that does nothing more than auto installs
other software without your permission or knowledge. It
changes its' process name repeatedly, hides itself inside
system files and the registry. This is why I mentioned in
an earlier post that "scanning" a system is a band-aid
approach to eliminating this problem - though still a
useful one.
You also have to factor in incredibly poor programming and
logic by the person who writes the code for X named
spyware. Many spyware programs use a local proxy to
accomplish what they do. Now if you have 2 or more programs
vying to secure your machines proxy settings - only 1 is
going to get it - but both programs are running on the
machine and trying to "execute" when the surfer does
something of interest. Now you have a program "trying" to
do something but since it doesn't have the proxy settings
secured - it uses system resources and your computer
performance is affected. I haven't come across too many
software applications that crash because it couldn't secure
a computer proxy setting. Now put 3-4-5 or even 6 spyware
applications on your machine and we're off to the races and
your car is going to come in last!
Any network administrator worth his salt doesn't allow
users to change network settings so it only takes 1 spyware
application repeatedly trying to change them to slow down a
pc at work.
Also factor in that many spyware servers are located in
offshore countries - that's a lot of hops and if their
server goes down or is just unreachable - your computer
grinds to a halt because they didn't put any safeguards on
what to do if that happens.
The software I created doesn't use socks or proxies and has
safeguards in place so a user won't be hung up if they
can't reach my server - remember, I called my software
Intelliware for a reason
As far as legal remedies to the solution - it's not going
to be a solution any time soon. We, as Americans, often
forget that there are PLENTY of countries where our laws
don't mean anything and spyware companies know exactly
where to set up shop.
Congress can stand on their desks, pass their laws and
stomp their feet all they want. The only solution to the
problem will come from 1 Microsoft Way - building 16 to be
more precise.
