Gaming Spyware, Adware, Viruses and Hacking

[spy46]

so like most if not all of you, i surf the web for what ever.

i look up game cheats, movie dates, a little history here and there.

i play 2-3 games .... or 5.

nothing really out of the normal.

then BAM! i suddenly have 396 + virus or other related programs on my computer:animeangr

so i start to wonder, why in the HELL do people do things like this to the every day guy/girl?

is said person just another 34 year old guy that still lives in his mothers basement and cant get a life so they try and mess with people that they don't even know and might be able to get away with it?

i mean sure if i was some big corporate head of some thing, OK i have money etc, or your boss fired you for the wrong reasons.

then you have you scamers that want to pretend to be you so they can rack up a VISA bill.

but aside from that, what is the point? to see how many people actually look up one kind of porn?

to find out just how many people have the games that you don't have but you want?

or could it be that you want to see the emails i send to my girl friend because you cant get one?

if there are any other reasons that i missed in here, please some one tell me what other reasons some idiot that does not have a life would bother to make programs like these?

:animesigh i feel better after a good rant.

[Konata]

>=( They don't ALL have to be 34 year old guys living in their basement. And some of them DO have a life =(

Anyways, on a serious note, I guess they're doing it so it can benefit them. Or perhaps they feel more in power. Like you stated, the whole credit card scams can be quite the profit for phishers. And likewise, keylogging, trojans, and all of that stuff can lead to gaining the right amount of information for credit card information, passwords, and all that good stuff.

If they're raiding your games, most likely, they're good enough to get the game ;P

And that doesn't rule out the possibility that they're just doing it for fun. The nature of man is savagery, right? [Thomas Hobbes-ism]

[Odin M Yggdrasi]

Many of these viruses are released under wraps from major security companies- methods by which to promote their product and keep themselves in business.

One of my favorite examples: Dr. Norton, he was once a hacker (second rate actually, but a hacker nonetheless) before he was hired by Symmantec to work on their anti virus and security products. It is high likely that he still does a fair amount of hacking and releasing of viruses, for the purposes of continuing Symmantec's business.

Also, a lot of exploits were devised for information gathering, not only could they have originally been meant for agencies like the CIA to snoop on potential threats but also for scammers to obtain the credit card information they desire.

There is one more point I would like to bring up- A lot of porn sites use viruses to track your movements, and see to it that you pay up for viewing their material. It might not make any sense at first, but obviously the information is useful to someone or there wouldn't be codes to track it.

And I still want to know how you people get viruses so often, my computers almost never get them- the few that do get in are usually in downloads, and I catch and kill them before infection occurs.

[Red]

[quote name='Odin M Yggdrasi']Many of these viruses are released under wraps from major security companies- methods by which to promote their product and keep themselves in business.

One of my favorite examples: Dr. Norton, he was once a hacker (second rate actually, but a hacker nonetheless) before he was hired by Symmantec to work on their anti virus and security products. It is high likely that he still does a fair amount of hacking and releasing of viruses, for the purposes of continuing Symmantec's business.

Also, a lot of exploits were devised for information gathering, not only could they have originally been meant for agencies like the CIA to snoop on potential threats but also for scammers to obtain the credit card information they desire.

There is one more point I would like to bring up- A lot of porn sites use viruses to track your movements, and see to it that you pay up for viewing their material. It might not make any sense at first, but obviously the information is useful to someone or there wouldn't be codes to track it.

And I still want to know how you people get viruses so often, my computers almost never get them- the few that do get in are usually in downloads, and I catch and kill them before infection occurs.[/QUOTE]

Dear dancing zombie jesus, I don't know whether to take this as a troll or one of the most hilarious pieces of bull's particulars I've read in a while.

Peter Norton was a developer (among other things) who created a few applications that fell under the "Norton Utilities" umbrella. His company was subsequently bought out by Symantec, who mainted the use of the Norton name on a few of their products. He was never a hacker, and as far as I know he hasn't taken up for giggles.

I'll admit, you'd be hard pressed to prove that security companies don't benefit from the continued propagation of viruses & exploits - but to suggest they cause them in the first place is, well...silly. It would require a conspiracy of biblical proportions; one that would totally dwarf the scale of something like the Manhattan Project.

Exploits are quite often the result of poor design, coding, quality assurance processes or a combination of all. Take a gander at my conspiracy note as it applies to your comment about the CIA, countless employees of god knows how many companies would have to be involved. As for scammers, some do indeed use exploits to carry credit card scams, but they're certainly not in league with the developers whose applications they exploit.

With regard to what you brought up about porn sites: it seems you're merging the concept of DRM with bog standard trojans and coming up with a tactic that no legitimate company could use without being caught at some point. That's not to say that all porn sites are virus free or that no virus would ever track your movements on the internet, though.

Finally, judging by the post quoted above I sincerely doubt that you personally intercept & destroy every virus that hits your machine. Any chance it's done by security software? :p

Spy46: it's done for a number of reasons, though the term 'hacker' used to be used only for those who covered their tracks, caused little if any damage and only infiltrated systems to gather information. There's plenty of money to be made in botnet harvesting (massive numbers of infected computers that are co-ordinated to spam or perform attacks), regular spamming, scamming etc. Some people create viruses as a proof of concept, some just want to try & bring the internet to it's knees. Some just find it fun!

The ol' sweaty-guy-in-a-basement stereotype is pretty much gone these days, though; people of all ages & backgrounds do it.

[Odin M Yggdrasi]

[quote name='Red']
Finally, judging by the post quoted above I sincerely doubt that you personally intercept & destroy every virus that hits your machine. Any chance it's done by security software? :p[/QUOTE]

Most of it is handled by AVG, but I still do some manual bughunting. I also manage the process list, operating my computer in a 'stripped out' state with as little running as possible to maintain stability. Actually it is very incredible how much speed even two year old machines have when running like that, at this very moment I am watching my hand-loaded Prescott HT3.4 run circles around a Core2Duo that has an OEM build/load with a benchmark program.

What I am interested in is how I am connecting to the same 'contaminated' internet as everyone else, and yet my computers remain clean while everyone else I know gets plastered.

Likely it is because of how I work- knowing what I do about computers I avoid areas that are likely to cause trouble.

And my claim about some sites using essentially viruses to track your movements and get you to pay for their product, I have encountered viruses designed for exactly that purpose on customer's machines. Suprisingly persistant about it too, took me forever to isolate and kill it.


Though I still like to do things the old-fashioned way. Regedit and Command Line.

And I love conspiracy theories, they actually explain a lot. Knowing what happens behind the closed doors of the industry gives me good reason to make them.

[Red]

[quote name='Odin M Yggdrasi']Actually it is very incredible how much speed even two year old machines have when running like that, at this very moment I am watching my hand-loaded Prescott HT3.4 run circles around a Core2Duo that has an OEM build/load with a benchmark program.[/quote]

Hard to believe unless you've got a terrible Core2 or a crippled system surrounding it, but I'll happily eat my words if you can provide solid proof.

[quote]What I am interested in is how I am connecting to the same 'contaminated' internet as everyone else, and yet my computers remain clean while everyone else I know gets plastered.

Likely it is because of how I work- knowing what I do about computers I avoid areas that are likely to cause trouble. [/quote]

Aye, a little common sense & caution goes a long way towards protecting yourself from threats on the internet.

[quote]And my claim about some sites using essentially viruses to track your movements and get you to pay for their product, I have encountered viruses designed for exactly that purpose on customer's machines. Suprisingly persistant about it too, took me forever to isolate and kill it.[/quote]

Again, proof please. I also said legitimate site :p

[quote]And I love conspiracy theories, they actually explain a lot.[/quote]

The ones you mentioned don't explain anything.

[quote]Knowing what happens behind the closed doors of the industry gives me good reason to make them.[/QUOTE]

Judging by your first post you don't seem to know much about what goes on "behind closed doors" since it's all made up :/

[Konata]

If you know OMY at least a little, he tends not to make a lot of sense. Or be very much believable.

Not intended for flaming purposes.

And what was with the Dr. Norton anyway? I lol'd. I know the program doesn't do anything to help me, but I don't ever remember Norton being a hacker, haha.

[AzureWolf]

*sits back, enjoying his virus-free mac* Did anyone notice that apple's search at their website reveals Windows when you type in virus?

Anyway, you could say there are a ton of reasons, but all of them have to do with money. Some sites get money for referral, even if it's a virus-induced pop-up, that gets people money. Same thing with adaware.

Information is a powerful thing. A powerful, financial thing, lol.

[SunfallE]

[COLOR="RoyalBlue"][FONT="Lucida Sans Unicode"][quote name='Red']Aye, a little common sense & caution goes a long way towards protecting yourself from threats on the internet. [/QUOTE]Totally true and probably the reason why I've never had an issue with stuff like this.

Anyway, my main experience would be with helping friends who couldn't be bothered to turn their updates to automatic, couldn't be bothered to use software designed to stop threats, in short couldn't be bothered to learn a little bit about simple steps to keep your computer safe. So I've battled plenty of this kind of nasty stuff, since I was helping my friends fix their computers. But for myself? It's never been an issue.

As for why people do it? As others have said, lots of reasons.
[/FONT][/COLOR]

[Allamorph]

[quote name='AzureWolf']*sits back, enjoying his virus-free mac*[/quote]
[FONT=Arial]Some idiot here on campus released a trojan into the Network that completely trashed my roomate's Macintosh laptop. It was down for a total of about twenty-eight hours, and it took until 6 pm yesterday to even restore booting capabilities. The OS was fried, and he had to export his hard drive so he could reformat. It's running again, but still....how do Macs get viruses?

And it is my belief that [COLOR="DarkRed"]Odin[/COLOR] is bipolar, or tripolar. :p[/FONT]

[spy46]

how i got ..... the virus and other programs that i have, is from a back door program .... or is it black door?

any ways, i got it looking for mods to CnC 3, but i didn't download any i just took a peek and ..... yeah ...... i find it stupid that a company would do that because to me that just tells me NOT to buy what ever they are selling.

if i had a virus and one pop up was about a game or what ever, i would go out of my way NOT to buy any thing related to them, i would even tell my friends and family not to.

but i just find it really annoying because as i am typing this now, i am fighting with pop up's and closing them, then banning the sites with my pop up blocker.

but this has also brought a question to my mind.

if by law we enter their sites at our own risk, would it not be the same for them to enter our computers?

i mean if i had the mother of all viruses on my computer and they downloaded it and it just destroyed their computer, would that not be at their own fault?

if so, then could some one not make a program that would send a feed back into the hackers computer ..... no not some thing like star trek or what ever.

more like uploading one song 50,000,000 times onto their computer until they disconnected from our computers:smirk:

[Desbreko]

[quote name='spy46']but i just find it really annoying because as i am typing this now, i am fighting with pop up's and closing them, then banning the sites with my pop up blocker.[/QUOTE][color=#4B0082]Just so you know, you're going about that the wrong way. You should remove the source, not just block the symptoms. If you haven't seen it already, the [thread=56772][u]Arcade Technical Help[/u][/thread] thread has advice for getting rid of spyware and viruses.[/color]

[Konata]

[quote name='Allamorph'][FONT=Arial]

And it is my belief that [COLOR="DarkRed"]Odin[/COLOR] is bipolar, or tripolar. :p[/FONT][/QUOTE]

Last time I checked, he wasn't. He just tried to be.

Aside from that, today, I got a lovely "Your computer may be infected with viruses or malware! You should download [insert generic fake spyware program name] today!" popup. I really hope that didn't come from my computer and not the Internet. =(

[Korey]

[FONT="Franklin Gothic Medium"]Even though everyone likes to poke fun at the OS, I think that Windows Vista has a decent spyware system and it does it's best to make sure you don't get viruses. I did get a free virus and pop up blocker and all my checks are scheduled daily. So I make sure to keep my computer up and runnning. If I notice things are going slowly, I always run a check on my computer first. Then I can get rid of viruses.

Spy, you said you downloaded mods for Command and Conquer Three right? Let me tell you, unless your computer is highly sufficient and you have little to nothing else on there, mods will DESTROY your computer's running speed....simply because they are hacking into programs that have written code into them and changing code to make your game different. Plus a lot of mods come from questionable sources and a lot of them can contain harmful things in their code package that may harm your computer, especially if your computer isn't up to snuff with theirs, which I suspect it isn't. So try uninstalling CnC 3 and taking off all the mods. That should free things up a bit.

BTW, what OS are you runnning? Windows? Mac? Linux? (far-fetched, because most Linux users do know a little sumpthin sumpthing bout computers)[/FONT]

[spy46]

question.

can a program turn XP off and make you run in mac mode or some thing?

i just tried to download some thing but it told me i need XP or vista, and i have XP

if they can do that, how would i turn XP back on?:confused:

[AzureWolf]

[quote name='spy46']question.

can a program turn XP off and make you run in mac mode or some thing?

i just tried to download some thing but it told me i need XP or vista, and i have XP

if they can do that, how would i turn XP back on?:confused:[/QUOTE]A program can turn off XP, but there's no such thing as a mac mode.

Look at the requirements/prompt more carefully. I bet it requires a specific version of XP. You probably need to update, or there is something like .NET framework you don't have. If you can show the exact wording, and your computer specs (right-click my computer --> click properties), then we can help you.

[Red]

[quote name='Korey'][FONT="Franklin Gothic Medium"]Let me tell you, unless your computer is highly sufficient and you have little to nothing else on there, mods will DESTROY your computer's running speed....simply because they are hacking into programs that have written code into them and changing code to make your game different. Plus a lot of mods come from questionable sources and a lot of them can contain harmful things in their code package that may harm your computer, especially if your computer isn't up to snuff with theirs, which I suspect it isn't. So try uninstalling CnC 3 and taking off all the mods. That should free things up a bit. [/FONT][/QUOTE]

A mod uses the structure of an existing game to modify the original or create a new game on top of it. Either modders are provided with an SDK (software development kit, e.g Half Life 1/2) or they modify files directly (e.g Freelancer) - either way, if modding is officially supported & the mod is coded properly it should use around the same level of resources as the original game. Simple things such as map/unit hacks shouldn't do squat.

Of course all this is ignoring things such as a total conversion mods, high res packs & mods that add new features like updated graphics, which can up the minimum requirement spec by a fair amount. That doesn't mean they're guaranteed to run your machine into the ground, though. Unless the mod contains malicious files it should have no effect on your computer when the game isn't running. That said, software can be a bugger and at times there will be completely inexplicable performance problems with certain mods - generally speaking, though, there aren't.

It is true that some files claiming to be mods contain malicious files, but the same can be said of every file on the 'net. That's why it's a good policy to scan everything you download! It's also worth using a reputable source like moddb.

[Guest Kinkos]

[quote name='spy46']so like most if not all of you, i surf the web for what ever.

i look up game cheats, movie dates, a little history here and there.

i play 2-3 games .... or 5.

nothing really out of the normal.

then BAM! i suddenly have 396 + virus or other related programs on my computer:animeangr

so i start to wonder, why in the HELL do people do things like this to the every day guy/girl?

is said person just another 34 year old guy that still lives in his mothers basement and cant get a life so they try and mess with people that they don't even know and might be able to get away with it?

i mean sure if i was some big corporate head of some thing, OK i have money etc, or your boss fired you for the wrong reasons.

then you have you scamers that want to pretend to be you so they can rack up a VISA bill.

but aside from that, what is the point? to see how many people actually look up one kind of porn?

to find out just how many people have the games that you don't have but you want?

or could it be that you want to see the emails i send to my girl friend because you cant get one?

if there are any other reasons that i missed in here, please some one tell me what other reasons some idiot that does not have a life would bother to make programs like these?

:animesigh i feel better after a good rant.[/QUOTE]

I think people do that is just to see what they can do and if they can do it better than someone else, or its just to mess with someone like you said.

But I really think that most of it is actually more about money. for example, If you run a site and someone emails you saying he would pay you $500 a month to put a virus on your site would you do it? I would, but only for the money. I think thats how most of them happen with people and money...

[Aberinkula]

[COLOR="77656"]I was looking up hentai a few days ago, and there was a real porn image and it said virs warning, but my computer said that nothing was there later on. So just because your comp has a virus, doens't mean the virus IS going to hurt your computer, or yourself so to say.

So if there isn't anything wrong with your comp, maybe it's just a fluke, than again I don't know much about computers except how to fix the memory and whatnot.[/COLOR]

[Nerdsy]

[quote name='Premonition'][COLOR="77656"]I was looking up hentai a few days ago, and there was a real porn image and it said virs warning, but my computer said that nothing was there later on. So just because your comp has a virus, doens't mean the virus IS going to hurt your computer, or yourself so to say.[/COLOR][/QUOTE]

[color=deeppink]From your description here, that sounds like it was just a pop-up or an add, which don't actually scan your computer for viruses. It was probably just bait.[/color]

[WishMakerz]

I know EXACTLY how you feel. I mean, they need a life.... Just a few days ago, I got malware for what? SURFING THE NET like I usually do. And now, I can't get rid of it no matter how hard I try to delete it. It just keeps on coming.