(e-mail address removed) (Anony Mouse) wrote in
My question is, to what extent is Mozilla immune from the annoyances
that make it necessary to use apps like Spyware Blaster, Spyware
Guard, AdAware, Spybot S&D, WinPatrol with Internet Explorer?
You should really ask the real experts in alt.privacy.spyware...
But here goes..
The vulnerability of IE to spy and adware compared to other browsers is
IMHO due to the following factors
1) Activex - Most "driveby downloads" get installed on IE computers because
of low Activex permissions or some careless user pressing "yes" when given
a choice. I would guess most newbies get infected this way just by surfing
to a website. Using a non-IE browser reduces this chance greatly since they
don't support Activex at all.
2) Security exploits - Some malware exploit known IE holes to run malware
regardless of your security settings. Again you can be infected just by
visiting a website. Naturally it doesn't work on a different browser.
3) A lot of ad/spyware can be installed on any computer, but mainly target
IE browsers (for example they change your IE homepage with a very specific
registry hack), so if you don't have IE, they have less if any effect.
Still it doesn't mean that there are no spyware/adware that affect mozilla
(to take an example). For example Lop is one of the few well known adware
that can actually infect a Mozilla browser.
Also some of the effects of such malware is generic, eg hijacking your
search engine by changing your host files.
A different browser other then IE will protect you from getting
automatically infected because it doesn't support Activex or have the same
security expoits but it won't protect you when you manually install
spy/adware from other sources. E.g You read about a cool app here, download
it and install it.. Guess what you are infected, because it was bundled
with spyware.
About specific products
AdAware, Spybot S&D - Since you can still be infected by other sources, you
need these to check for malware. Many of the secondary functions in spybot
will be not needed though. E.g the resident helper is implemented as a BHO
which works only in IE, the immunization (see spywareblaster) etc.
Spyware Guard - This one actually scans all files with the extension exe
and cab (normally installation files ) as they are run. You might want this
since it's a real time scan for spyware before they are installed.
Spywareblaster - The main purpose is to handle and block known "evil"
activex controls, so I believe this is of less utility if you never use IE,
since no other browser runs activex. I've read though that some MS stuff
like Windows Media Player actually run activex too though.
Winpatrol - Not too familar with this one, but I doubt the cookie
management would work. But other functions like controlling startups would
still be very useful to detect viruses, trojans etc.
Aaron (my email is not munged!)
