The Spyware Weekly Newsletter is distributed every week to 20,000 subscribers and read online by hundreds of thousands of visitors. Please read our Terms of Use for quoting guidelines. http://www.spywareinfoforum.info/newlsetter/dec10,2004.

Wherever the term "adware" is used, it is referring to a category of software, not to any particular company or product.

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I have to admit, this is funny. I had a nice, long laugh about this one. Adware company DirectRevenue has included code in its software that seeks out and destroys competing adware. Another adware company whose software is targeted for destruction has filed a lawsuit against them. This is sort of like a slap fight on Jerry Springer. Both sides are sleazy and it is hard to decide who to root for but it sure is funny to watch.

In the end though, I would have to say that DirectRevenue is in the wrong. You can't have software that destroys someone else's software, unless the computer owner wants it to be destroyed. You certainly shouldn't be destroying software from a competitor.

A few years ago a media player called Radlight did the basically the same thing. Radlight installed WhenU adware and it also destroyed any installation of Ad-Aware. Virtually the entire antispyware community (very small at the time, but extremely loud) declared war. Radlight was condemned on web sites and message boards everywhere; boycotts were organized; the press picked up on it; and Radlight's software became targeted as malware by both Ad-aware and Spybot.

It was wrong then and it is wrong now. Deliberately installing software that you know is going to remove other software, such as antispyware or antivirus programs, is one thing. Simply eradicating your competitors is something else entirely and DirectRevenue should stop doing it.

Also, someone has just pointed out a very in-depth article about DirectRevenue at MSNBC's web site. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6689667/site/newsweek/

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Program: X-Cleaner
Author: X-Block
Platform: Windows 9x, ME, NT 4.0, 2K, XP
License: $39.95 [35% off for SpywareInfo readers]
Coupon code: XBLO-M8PS-GO (Expires December 15, 2004)
In addition all subscribers will be able to purchase the program for family and friends for $15.00. This offer will be made available after the user has logged into the member's center.
More Information: http://www.spywareinfoforum.info/downloads/x/

X-Cleaner Spyware Remover is an award winning spyware detector that finds and removes commercial spyware programs. X-Cleaner also features a unique mobile active-x spy scanning utility so you can login through your member's center and use it from public terminals.

A new feature of the program even allows you to bypass hardware keyloggers which use no software that can be detected.

No installation required - simply download and use or you may install if you choose. X-Cleaner provides courteous support via e-mail for registered users. Software is delivered instantly via digital download and you can download new versions as often as you like the first year.

You can even put this on a floppy disk and carry it to work in an envelope or in your shirt pocket. Insert floppy, scan and zap the keylogger or delete your surfing traces.

X-Cleaner was recommended by Kim Komando in her article for MSN, Danger, danger: 5 tips for using a public PC.

Features

1) New expanded detection and removal database.

2) General Interface Improvement- Users can now resize the program window to fit into their screen anyway they like, especially useful for the encyclopedia where they had to scroll right.

3) Bypass *hardware* keyloggers using onscreen keyboard for input- This is under the Expert tab for Deluxe Users only and makes use of the built-in based keyboard in Windows so that users can key in information without using physical keystrokes. This is very useful for sending sensitive material since hardware keyloggers (a growing threat X-Block is working on) evade anti-spyware which normally targets software loggers only. Given X-Cleaner's mobility in terms of file size, this is a useful little addition to have since you can go to an Internet Cafe- sweep for keyloggers (or use the full active-x scanner in the members area) and then use the software based keypad to evade hardware logging.

4) Direct link to online assistance integrated into software- as always X-Cleaner technicians are dedicated to providing prompt and professional e-mail support for even hard to remove cases of the spyware plague.

If you have any problems with the ordering page or with the coupon code (XBLO-M8PS-GO), please email Catherine http://www.spywareinfoforum.info/email2.php.

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Last week's newsletter certainly was interesting. As far as I can remember, I've never had to publish an outright retraction of something I've written. Not an hour after sending last week's newsletter I thought I was going to have to retract two stories at once.

The story about Computer Associates labeling Kazaa as spyware was the first one to worry me. Several people pointed out that PestPatrol, now owned by Computer Associates, labels their targets as "pests". And yet, several dozen news stories were out at the time all proclaiming that CA had slapped Kazaa with the spyware label. What was going on here?

While it is true that PestPatrol labels targets as pests, CA is not following their example. CA does indeed call Kazaa "spyware".
http://www3.ca.com/securityadvisor/pest/
http://www3.ca.com/securityadvisor/pest/collateral.aspx?cid=64476

The other story worried me far more. I wrote a story saying that SBC Telecom is threatening to cancel discounts or services to people who choose to opt out of SBC's plan to share their personal information with their subsidiary companies. Almost immediately, I started hearing from people that had called to opt out and received no such threat. Unsettled by the possibility that I had just grossly slandered a very large company, I asked to hear from more customers. Dozens of people contacted me and I thank each of them for writing.

There definitely is a pattern in the emails I received. Those in California who call SBC to opt out are being told that existing discounts and possibly their service may be discontinued if they go through with it. This is indisputable. The FCC, the California Public Utilities Commission and now even a California Senator is interested in looking into the situation.

What is not clear is whether this is going on nationwide or just in California. Some readers from different parts of The United States said their discounts and services were threatened, while others did not. One woman was threatened with termination of service by an SBC customer service rep, only to be called back later by that rep's supervisor who apologized and said that discounts and services would remain the same regardless of whether or not she opted out of the plan.

I think I should explain my own outrage over the situation. Businesses these days are under the mistaken impression that they have the right to sell information about the customers who buy or lease their services. Where no laws exist to spell out the fact that they do not have this right, they treat their customers' information as a commodity to be bought, sold and traded at will. You would think your bank would never reveal information about their customers. You would be wrong. How do you think credit card companies know so much about you when they send you junk mail? They buy or rent that information from your bank.

When you pay for DSL service, you receive a DSL signal in exchange for a monthly fee. That is a straightforward transaction. What the company may not tell you is that they also make money selling and renting all of the private information you gave them when you ordered your service. In effect, they are profiting twice from each customer. They take your money in exchange for service, which is a fair trade. Then they also sell your information; and this is not a fair trade, since you receive no compensation at all.

As far as I am concerned, companies should not have it both ways. Either keep customer information private or give them the service for free, if you're going to sell their personal information. I place value on my personal information and expect payment before anyone is allowed to treat it as a commodity. If I pay for a service and the company turns around and makes money selling my personal information, I view that as information theft.

Under federal and state laws, companies in certain industries are required to allow customers to opt out of having any of their personal information provided to any other company. This is a right spelled out in the law. What outrages me is the fact that SBC is telling people, who wish to opt out, that their bills will go up or that their service will be terminated. In my personal opinion, you can call it nothing but extortion when SBC threatens customers with the loss of their discounts or even their service when they try to exercise their legal rights.

That SBC would stoop to such tactics should not be surprising. This is the same company that had to be forced kicking and screaming by the government to stop refusing SBC DSL internet service to people who did not order SBC telephone service.

So, rather than retract what I said last week, I repeat it. Call SBC to tell them you will opting out of their plan to share your information with their subsidiaries. If SBC tells you that your existing discounts or services will be terminated, file a complaint with the California Attorney-General, the California Public Utilities Commission and the Federal Communications Commission. You might also contact Senator Jackie Speier in the California statehouse.

This assumes, of course, that you live in California. All states have an Attorney-General and a division that regulates telecommunication companies. A quick search on Google should be all you need to find their offices.

To file a complaint with the California Public Utilities Commission, you can use an online form available at http://www.cpuc.ca.gov/static/forms/complaint.htm

To file a complaint with the California Attorney-General, you can use an online form available at http://ag.ca.gov/consumers/mailform.htm

To file a complaint with the FCC, send an email to fccinfo@fcc.gov or call (888) 225-5322.

I am going to reprint some of the letters I received so you can see the frustration and anger SBC is causing in their customers.

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I live in San Francisco. SBC has been one of the worst when it comes to customer service or tech support ever since they "took over" for the local Pacific Bell provider. I have been telling anyone who asks that they should find an alternative to SBC if possible. It looks now as if I should take my own advice.

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After reading your story and the original story in the Chronicle I tried to call SBC to find out more about what might happen if I chose to opt out. It took 3 transfers before I was able to speak to someone who could answer any of my questions. She said that if I had any kind of "bundled package" where SBC provided more than one service, "such as phone, internet, etc." it was likely my bill would go up because I would no longer be eligible for the bundled package.

She could not tell me without transferring me back to billing whether I did in fact have a bundled package or not, however since my phone bill includes the aDSL service fee I can only assume I do.

Thank you for publishing this. I missed the article in the paper - and none of my co-workers were aware of it either.

Kirby

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I am a consultant and project manager who has worked with many of the RBOCs (Regional Bell Operating Companies) including SBC, Verizon, BellSouth, etc., and despite the amount of consolidation in their industry, most of them are still a loose conglomeration of the original telephone companies they acquired with separate and often different products, pricing, policies, and operating practices. Although I have no personal knowledge of the specific situation in the San Francisco area, I wouldn't be a bit surprised if they operate separately from other SBC entities in other regions, and that their policy has not been implemented throughout SBC's entire system.

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Hello Mike,
I live in Santa Cruz CA...which is considered part of the Bay Area...

Here is how it went down for me.

I can opt out...but i will not continue receiving the "yahoo" discount of $20.00 a month. I asked her to explain to why this would be...here is their insane logic!

SBC and Yahoo merged and are now affiliates. But they are not the same company...the emphasis is on the word "affiliates" If i opt out and do not let them share my billing information with Yahoo...yahoo cannot bill me for "their" services and therefore cannot apply any discounts to my dsl account.

I told her that was complete nonsence...and that it is not my problem if they can't work out customer billing with "their affiliate" ....without invading my privacy and taking away my discounts. I also told her that i would be finding another dsl provider immediately and would notify them when to discontinue my account with them. They get approximately $100.00 a month from me. Like you said...i hope everyone else does the same thing.

Can you recommend a good dsl provider?

hope this helps you
Dianna

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Hi,
I just talked to an SBC rep and she did warn me that the $20 discount on dsl service I receive every month is in danger by opting out. She went on to explain that the reason for this is because the provider of the service is an affiliate (a company called AFI) and that it is only one of four that she knows of that will ever get my telephone number. Because SBC actually contracts out the service to provide dsl in the first place. Should my phone number would not be made available to them, I couldn't receive the service to begin with.

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Mike:

I called, and in my particular case, the only entity my billing information is shared with is their affiliate long distance carrier SBC-Long Distance. If I opt out I loose a 30% discount on the long distance service or $10. It was one of the most confusing calls I've ever made, and I'm not easily confused. Bottom line is that I'm not sure that I care if SBC-Long Distance shares my billing info, and they assured me that they share it with no one else (3rd Party or otherwise). Hope this input helps.

Ken

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I called and told them I wanted to opt out of the information sharing and was told I would have to give up my long distance and dsl if I did this. I live in Paris, Texas. I called 1-888-387-6270 and spoke with [removed]. Needless to say I'm pissed. So your first warning was correct.
Sherry

Later...

I just emailed you about my experience when I tried to opt out of their info sharing. A "supervisor" called me back and apologized and removed me per my request. They assured me that there will be no changes in my account in anyway. Wonder if it was because the last thing I said before I hung up on them was that I would be notifying FCC first thing in the morning along with an attorney to file a class action suit. Thanks for the heads up on this. You now have a lifelong subscriber. Kudos.

Sherry
p.s. Do you think I should still notify FCC?

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I have found someone else who shares my opinion of companies buying and selling customer information. This is a very good rant and an interesting read: http://www.orangecrate.com/article.php?sid=901

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I have some good news about another story I wrote last week. A soldier in a nearby city had a break-in at his home. His body armor was stolen. This soldier soon will be deployed to Iraq. The Army is going to issue a replacement to that soldier before he is shipped overseas. The soldier may or may not have to reimburse the Army for the cost of the armor. That is not clear at the moment. I've offered to chip in if the Army makes the soldier pay for his replacement armor.

Apparently there is new policy regarding soldiers deployed to combat zones. They are always issued appropriate safety equipment before they are shipped out. There was a lot of noise a while back about families of soldiers having to buy body armor themselves and then sending it to their sons and daughters in combat zones. Whether this was true or not, that is not the case now.

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One last thing and then I will stop going on about last week's newsletter.

I mentioned that AOL's newest software can be used as spyware by anyone with the "master" account's password. One reader wrote to correct me on that. It turns out that you are not able to spy on anyone whose screen name is set on the "adult" setting. You can only spy on (or monitor) those screen names set for "child" or "young teen".

I'm sorry for the confusion about that.

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You're checking out a Web site, looking to buy a plane ticket or maybe a cell phone. Just as you're ready to buy, a pop-up window appears: Another company is making you a more enticing offer for its competing product. You take the better deal, right? But a little later, you begin to wonder: How did the pop-up rival know what you were up to? Did you just hand over money to an online stalker?

Read the rest of this article at http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/88/techsupport.html

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Claria, the company responsible for Gator adware, has made a consumer-friendly decision to trim their End User License Agreement (EULA). Specifically, they are taking it from 6,000 words down to 2,500 words. They reportedly are removing the clause that prohibits the use of packet sniffers on its software.

Claria states that the license is being updated in response to pressure from consumer advocacy groups. Personally, I am glad to see this decision. It definitely is a move in the right direction.

In the MediaPost article where I discovered this, I see no mention of the clause prohibiting the removal of Gator by third party software. I also see no mention of how the license will be presented. One common complaint about Gator's license (and indeed all adware) is that often it appears in a small box which requires a reader to scroll several dozen times in order to see the whole thing. I am trying to contact the company to clarify this.

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Yes I read this entire article and yes I understand exactly the writer's logic. I still reject it as blatantly stupid. The writer suggests that the best way to preserve privacy is to make every single aspect of every single person's life public information.

Anyway, give it a read and decide for yourself if the guy is crazy or just an idiot.

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My partner and I are going through the submissions for t-shirt lines now. We will have a submission picked out and announce the winning line in next week's newsletter. Thank you very much to everyone who submitted a funny line. The response was excellent and apparently some of you are pretty good comedians.

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I do not intentionally link to web sites that require registration before allowing visitors to read the article. At the time I read these articles, I was not required to register. If one of these sites requires that you register before allowing you to read the article, please let me know and I will blacklist that site.

http://www.futurebrief.com/jeffharrowprivacy.asp :: Shrinking Technology - Shrinking Privacy?
http://www.futurebrief.com/jeffharrowbuggy008.asp :: Is Personal Privacy Going the Way of the Buggy Whip?

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/12/09/symantec_virus_forecast_2005/ :: The strange death of the mass mailing virus

http://www.dmnews.com/cgi-bin/artprevbot.cgi?article_id=31166 :: Privacy Group Decries 'Loophole' for Prerecorded Messages

http://ottawa.cbc.ca/regional/servlet/View?filename=ott-spam-privacy-041207 :: Ruling says spam violates privacy laws

http://p2pnet.net/story/3215 :: DRM personal privacy threat

http://www.phillyburbs.com/pb-dyn/news/113-12062004-411978.html :: Cops divulging too much info?

http://msnbc.msn.com/id/6653413/site/newsweek/ :: Invasion of the PC Snatchers

http://www.madison.com/tct/business/index.php?ntid=19863&ntpid=0 :: Spyware, adware, oh my!

http://www.ecommercetimes.com/story/Search-Toolbars-Now-Mainstream-Browser-Tool-38583.html :: Search Toolbars Now Mainstream Browser Tool

http://www.berkshireeagle.com/Stories/0,1413,101~7514~2570905,00.html :: Bosley intent on thwarting spyware

http://www.suntimes.com/output/news/cst-nws-fone27.html :: Loophole would let messages penetrate Do Not Call list

http://moneycentral.msn.com/content/Banking/FinancialPrivacy/P73724.asp :: How to fight spam, junk mail and sales calls

http://www.registerguard.com/news/2004/11/29/a1.uospyware.1129.html :: Beware Spyware — Infections on Rise

http://www.techweb.com/wire/networking/54200967 :: Computer Firms Score Poorly In Privacy, Customer Response

http://news.zdnet.com/2100-1009_22-5469837.html :: Random answers retain privacy

http://www.newstarget.com/002542.html :: Color laser printers snitch on their owners

http://news.independent.co.uk/business/analysis_and_features/story.jsp?story=587774 :: Small Talk: Spyware company has its eye on a fund raiser

http://www.onlypunjab.com/fullstory1104-insight-MetroPipe+Releases+Technology-status-10-newsID-7581.html :: MetroPipe Releases Technology Preview of the Portable Virtual Privacy Machine

http://www.theinquirer.net/?article=19889 :: CIA funds monitoring of IRC

http://www.crmbuyer.com/story/Whose-Computer-Is-This-38386.html :: Whose Computer Is This?

http://www.missoulian.com/articles/2004/11/24/opinion/opinion4.txt :: Take privacy for granted at your peril

http://www.dmnews.com/cgi-bin/artprevbot.cgi?article_id=31131 :: ID Theft, Spyware Could Dent Holiday E-Commerce