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Raw Bytes Computer News KPBX FM 91.1 Radio National Public Radio Network Frank Delaney Producer Broadcast on Thursday Morning 7:35 AM During Morning Edition Support Public Radio ! The Theater Of the Mind |
In computer news this week –
Feb. 17, 2005 |
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Is your computer a Zombie ? It’s like a
scenario from a bad 50’s sci-fi movie; Invasion of the Body Snatchers,
Night of the Living Dead, or kind of like “The Blob” for you Baby
boomers who might remember that Jello-ish thriller – but now it’s
2005 and the plot is that an evil alien has captured your home pc and it is
completely under its power – unknown to you - its owner. The scariest thing here
– is that it’s true !! Last week I talked
about one of the biggest antispam organizations in the world - the Spamhaus Project – http://www.spamhaus.org -
where you can find a lot of good information about fighting spam. Spammers have
traditionally used software to route their spam through a mass of
"zombie machines" to reach recipients. Zombies are computers
connected to the Internet that have been infected with malicious programs
that give hackers control over the machines. This might be a spyware program
that downloaded itself to your computer without your knowing anything about
it. Usually these are pc’s using highspeed connections; DSL or cable
modem, but not always. An increasing amount of
spam is being sent to zombie machines and then passed through servers at the
zombie machines' Internet service providers before reaching recipients. This technique makes
blocking spam more tricky, and it has also caused some ISP’s –
including some Spokane ISP’s at some times – to be placed on the
Spamhaus’ Known Spammers Lists.
Then you can’t send email to your friends who use that ISP, and
they can’t send to you, because their ISP has been listed as a known
spammer, and all emails to and from that ISP are being blocked. The Zombie problem puts
the burden on ISPs to monitor their outgoing mail carefully, however, and
make sure they aren't being used as a proxy for spammers. Spamhaus estimates
that as much as 75 percent of the traffic arriving at most ISPs is
unsolicited commercial email, and some ISPs already monitor their outbound
mail, but not all. So how do you find out
if your own pc has a double life as your mild mannered home computers when
you’re watching it, and as an evil spam machine when you’re away? One good solution would
be to download Microsoft’s new free antispyware detection program,
which you can download at Free
Microsoft AntiSpyware Program. You can download and
run this program for free, and it can be set to update itself automatically.
It will look for and remove any spyware programs it finds on your pc,
including programs that might be causing your pc to have the Zombie split
personality. Many other companies
now offer similar programs, which are usually part of what has now become
known as an Internet Security Program, such as Panda Internet
Security which protects you from computer viruses, spam, and spyware
programs. So Zombies are a
reality in the internet world of today, and you need to make sure your own pc
doesn’t have a secret life. For Raw Bytes This is Frank Delaney (C) 2005 MTA Micro Technology
Associates http://www.mtamicro.com/kpbx.html (509)624-7230 |
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