beforeyoukillyourcomputer.com Saving computers one at a time from their owners

The ongoing investigation into the hacking of Republican vice-presidential nominee Sarah Palin’s Yahoo e-mail account now appears to center on the son of a Democratic state legislator in Tennessee. A federal grand jury convened Tuesday morning in Chattanooga to hear testimony from friends of David Kernell, a 20-year-old economics student at the University of Tennessee whose apartment was raided by the FBI early Sunday morning, but ended their session for the day without issuing an indictment.

Kernell, whose father is Tennessee State Representative Michael Kernell, is the target of widespread speculation in the blogosphere. The attention came after a post appeared on the online chat board, 4chan, describing how it “took seriously 45 mins on wikipedia and google to find the info” needed to access the Alaska governor’s personal e-mail account using Yahoo’s password reset feature. (A Yahoo spokesperson indicated that the company is continually reviewing its security procedures, but had not planned any specific changes yet.)

According to the 4chan message, the author’s curiosity had been piqued by press reports concerning Palin’s alleged use of another, more public, Yahoo account, to conduct state business. After gaining access to the account, the self-described hacker wrote, he had searched without success for incriminating e-mails, and posted the new account password to the board so others could do the same. He soon realized that “if this sh*t ever got to the FBI I was f—ed, I panicked.” The author of the post used the handle “Rubico,” which was tied to a Yahoo e-mail address easily linked to Kernell via Google searches—though given the penchant for pranksterism at 4chan, this was scarcely definitive evidence.

Law enforcement officials did not appear to have taken an overt interest in Kernell as quickly as bloggers had.

This utility, which has the most comprehensive knowledge of auto-starting locations of any startup monitor, shows you what programs are configured to run during system bootup or login, and shows you the entries in the order Windows processes them. These programs include ones in your startup folder, Run, RunOnce, and other Registry keys. You can configure Autoruns to show other locations, including Explorer shell extensions, toolbars, browser helper objects, Winlogon notifications, auto-start services, and much more. Autoruns goes way beyond the MSConfig utility bundled with Windows Me and XP.

Autoruns’ Hide Signed Microsoft Entries option helps you to zoom in on third-party auto-starting images that have been added to your system and it has support for looking at the auto-starting images configured for other accounts configured on a system. Also included in the download package is a command-line equivalent that can output in CSV format, Autorunsc.

You’ll probably be surprised at how many executables are launched automatically!

Autoruns works on Windows 2000 SP4 Rollup 1 or above.

Download Autoruns 9.31

Autorunsc Usage

Autorunsc is the command-line version of Autoruns. Its usage syntax is:

Usage: autorunsc [-a] | [-c] [-b] [-d] [-e] [-g] [-h] [-i] [-l] [-m] [-n] [-p] [-r] [-s] [-v] [-w] [-x] [user]
-a Show all entries.
-b Boot execute.
-c Print output as CSV.
-d Appinit DLLs.
-e Explorer addons.
-g Sidebar gadgets (Vista and higher).
-h Image hijacks.
-i Internet Explorer addons.
-l Logon startups (this is the default).
-m Hide signed Microsoft entries.
-n Winsock protocol and network providers.
-p Printer monitor drivers.
-r LSA providers.
-s Autostart services and non-disabled drivers.
-t Scheduled tasks.
-v Verify digital signatures.
-w Winlogon entries.
-x Print output as XML.
user Specifies the name of the user account for which autorun items will be shown.

Basic antivirus and antispyware protection for Windows available to download for free. Limited features, no support, for private and non-commercial use only.

* The most downloaded software on CNET’s Download.com
* Quality proven by 70 millions of users
* Easy to download, install and use
* Protection against viruses and spyware
* Compatible with Windows Vista and Windows XP

Download AVG Anti-Virus Free Edition 8.0.138

AVG Anti-Virus Free Edition 8.0 PDF User Manual

CurrPorts displays the list of all currently opened TCP/IP and UDP ports on your local computer. For each port in the list, information about the process that opened the port is also displayed, including the process name, full path of the process, version information of the process (product name, file description, and so on), the time that the process was created, and the user that created it.

In addition, CurrPorts allows you to close unwanted TCP connections, kill the process that opened the ports, and save the TCP/UDP ports information to HTML file , XML file, or to tab-delimited text file.
CurrPorts also automatically mark with pink color suspicious TCP/UDP ports owned by unidentified applications (Applications without version information and icons)

Download CurrPorts 1.40

Comodo Firewall rated by PC Magazine Online as an Editor’s Choice, constantly monitors and defends your PC from internet attacks. It’s easy to install and use and passes the industry’s most stringent firewall “leak” tests. Unlike some other ‘free’ firewalls, this is not a stripped down version but is the full, completely functional product. This free solution comes complete with continual updates that are FREE forever!

Comodo Personal Firewall 3.0 – System Requirements
* Windows XP (SP2) – 32 bit version
* Windows XP – 64 bit version
* Windows Vista – 32 and 64 bit versions
* 64 Mb RAM
* 35 MB hard disk space for 32-bit versions and 55 MB for 64-bit versions

Download Comodo Firewall Pro 3.0.24.368 - Vista 32/XP (Full)
Download Comodo Firewall Pro 3.0.24.368 - Vista 64 (Full)

Version 3.0.24.368 : 24th May, 2008
* FIXED! COMODO Firewall activation fails under some circumstances.

Version 3.0.23.364 : 22nd May, 2008
* NEW! COMODO SafeSurf Toolbar built on COMODO Memory Firewall technology.
* FIXED! COMODO Firewall does not add files from network shares to pending list.
* FIXED! COMODO Firewall does not log incoming ICMP packets properly.
* FIXED! COMODO Firewall blocks everything when password protection is OFF and suppress options are ON.
* FIXED! COMODO Firewall does not terminate active connections properly.
* FIXED! COMODO Firewall firewall driver can not be installed properly in Vista operating systems.
* FIXED! COMODO Firewall can be terminated when Windows XP is being shutdown.
* FIXED!

This bad boy isn’t your daddy’s USB porn drive (but maybe it should be). It’s the real deal for keeping your data safe and secure.

The IronKey USB flash drive is one of the most secure devices I’ve ever worked with, but simultaneously tries to be–and achieves being–among the simplest to interact with in achieving that security. The product, from the eponymous company IronKey, comes in capacities from 1 GB to 8 GB that encrypts data five ways to Sunday while achieving government certification as tamper evident. A secured, anonymized version of Firefox is also onboard. Prices start at $79 including a one-year subscription for anonymous browsing; an 8 GB drive is $299…

For starters, there’s hardware AES encryption on board the sleek metal drive: there’s no software to install on a host computer, and all encryption happens within the drive. This dramatically improves the security profile. Encryption keys are stored only on the drive, and only unlocked when a password you create at the time you initialize the drive is entered. (IronKey lets you back that password up on their secure Web servers with additional layers of authentication in case you forget it; accessing your account requires a digital certificate stored on the IronKey.)

Enter the password incorrectly 10 times, and the hardware fries itself. Likewise, if an IronKey is physically tampered with in an attempt to access the on-board flash memory directly, the hardware wipes memory as well. Their tamper-resistance has led to FIPS 140-2 Level 2 validation by the U.S. and Canadian governments–physical tampering must be evident–and they’re working on Level 3, which requires countermeasures to attempts to disassemble the hardware…

Symantec claims its 2009 Internet Security products will have “zero impact” on PC performance…

“Fundamentally, consumers don’t want to be bothered at all. We’ve set as our goal zero-impact security,” she said…

Symantec claims one of the ways the product will make less demand on system resources is by scaling back on the amount of scanning. “Our new technology allows us to scan less,” claimed Chaffin. “We know which files are good files and we can scan those less.”

“If software runs on millions of systems, it’s going to be good software,” Chaffin added. “If software only runs on a small number of machines, chances are it’s bad.”

Is there not a chance malware writers will quickly cotton on to which applications Norton is scanning less frequently and target those? “If they modify a file in any way, we can scan,” claimed Mallon.

Norton will also use the past history of the user to gauge how much scanning is necessary. “If someone’s not been infected before, the chances of them being infected are low.”

Norton Internet Security 2009 and Antivirus 2009 will be out this autumn.

Source

Ad-Aware provides protection from known Spyware including: Data-mining, aggressive advertising, Parasites, Scumware, selected traditional Trojans, Dialers, Malware, Browser hijackers, and tracking components.

What’s New in 2008:
* Improved Threat Detection
o Spyware, Adware, Trojans & Hijackers
o Fraud Tools & Rogue Applications
o Password Stealers & Keyloggers
* Enhanced Rootkit removal system
* Faster Updates & Faster Scans
* Less Resource Usage for optimal computer performance
* Easy to Download, Install and Use
* Lavasoft ThreatWork submission tool
* Compatible with Windows Vista (32- and 64-bit)

More feature details:
* NEW! Extensive Detection Database - Bigger and better detection to guard your privacy against malware attacks.
* Advanced Code Sequence Identification (CSI) Technology - Precise detection of embedded malware including Trojans, worms, spyware, bots, and other forms of deceptive malware.
* NEW! Enhanced Rootkit Removal System - Rootkit detection technology to find and remove hidden threats.
* TrackSweep - Control your privacy by erasing tracks left behind while surfing the Web on multiple browsers, including Internet Explorer, Firefox, and Opera, with one easy click.
* Easy to Download, Install & Use - Effortlessly maneuver the complexities of malware detection and removal with our new user-friendly interface.
* NEW! Lavasoft ThreatWork - Directly submit suspicious files for analysis via ThreatWork, an alliance of global anti-spyware security volunteers actively fighting online threats.

An anonymous reader recommends a Computerworld article on a new report from Australian security vendor PC Tools. The company released figures on malware detection by its ThreatFire product, and in its user base 27% of Vista machines were compromised by at least one instance of malware. From the article:

“In total, Vista suffered 121,380 instances of malware from its 190,000 user base, a rate of malware detection per system [that] is proportionally lower than that of XP, which saw 1,319,144 malware infections from a user base of 1,297,828 machines, but it indicates a problem that is worse than Microsoft has been admitting to.”

Microsoft hasn’t responded yet to this report.

Source

By now, everyone has heard horror stories about invasions of privacy, cyber-bullying, photos taken out of context, embarrassing videos posted online and the mob mentality of some commenters.

Let’s take just one example: in 2002, a Canadian boy filmed himself swinging a golf ball retriever as if he were a Jedi knight. For a while, the tape lay forgotten. Then some of his friends saw it, and without his permission, placed it online.

Within two weeks, the video had been posted in many places and viewed millions of times. Spin-off videos were produced, adding soundtracks and extra graphics. People who encountered the video of the Star Wars Kid online happily forwarded it to friends – without considering the ethical implications.

Full Story (Times Online)