How do you get a cold? You get exposed to a germ, right? This may be a very simplified explanation of getting a cold, but the basic principle is the same when it comes to malicious software. We all know what malicious software is, it is a program that does unwanted and in many cases destructive things on your computer. Typical examples of malicious software are viruses, spyware and ad-ware. You have to expose your computer to a malicious program to get infected by it 4K Video Downloader Crack . This can happen in many ways, by using an infected Floppy Disk, CD, DVD, hard-drive or flash drive. You may get infected when opening an attachment of an infected e-mail message. But if you use common sense you have a smaller chance of getting infected. Only use disks from trusted sources, don’t open strange e-mails and even if you use material from a trusted source, ensure that it is scanned by a respectable Anti-virus scanner.
There is one method of infection I did not mention and that is through the use Internet by browsing from web site to web site. Common sense also plays a role here. If a link looks strange, don’t click on it. If you are required to enter sensitive information that is not relevant to your visit, don’t do it. By using a browser with good security measures will make you less vulnerable. But one problem that can’t be fixed with security software is people’s moral values. Ignorance plays a significant role in infections but I don’t believe that it plays such a big role as people’s intentions when using the Internet.
Many infections occur when the user was either doing something illegal or immoral. The evidence is clear when you try to fix an infected PC. The Internet History and the Temporary Internet Files folder is most of the times cluttered with cookies and cache of pornographic and piracy sites. Piracy sites range from pirate music to pirate software. Many of the cracks downloaded from the Internet are actual Trojan Horses (a host program that gives malicious software access to your computer) but they usually imply to bypass the anti-piracy sections of a program to allow the user to use a full licensed version of the software. Sometimes they even do actually crack the software but installs a malicious program in the background without the knowledge of the user. Some sites require users to install specific software in order to gain access to their pirate or pornographic content. These programs are nothing other than spyware, which monitors activities like keystrokes from your keyboard to record passwords. They also spy on your online activity and store this information on their servers in order to send you relevant marketing material and spin you deeper into their web. What users often don’t realize is that their PC becomes a source of malicious activity. Many of these companies will load your computer with malicious software and try to infect everyone you communicate with, either through your local network or the Internet. Your PC may become a spamming engine, sending spam to all your contacts. Your PC will in the end earn revenue for these dishonest organizations and you may become an accomplice in illegal activities without even knowing it.
All these are consequences of the immoral and dishonest actions of the user in the first place. If people stay away from piracy and pornography sites we will deal with lesser malicious software threats. If lesser people use these websites, these organizations will make less money from these sites and will in the end be forced to shut it down. This will be to the benefit to the whole online-community, but also the music, television and software industry, due to smaller volumes of piracy. In the end it will put money back into the pocket of the end-user and keep our children safe from the filthy material on the Web.
Software security wouldn’t really be an issue, if all software licenses were simple agreements setting out reasonable terms of use. Unfortunately, most are lengthy texts with legal slang that leave those few who do read them bedeviled and thwarted. Some enclose terms to which the ordinary user would object if he acknowledged what he was agreeing to. For example, in extension to protection against cracking, many software licenses now contribute the software company the right to gather information about your computer and have it automatically sent to the software marketer. Some, in particular software licenses for freeware, hold clauses whereby you agree to the installation of added software you do not want, some of it conspicuous spyware or adware. As a result, one might assume that the freeware is to blame for all the bad things that have happened, however, isn’t it the end user who doesn’t read the legal material, who is to blame?
Either way, people do not read the EULA. When downloading and installing software, we are usually curious about what the new software will bring. That EULA is just one more thing to drop time on because it is usually not readable in a short amount of time, hence not read at all. But indeed, the next thought that then arises is: what have you agreed to when you clicked I agree?
Especially with freeware, there can be an even greater problem. Freeware is not always free. Sure, it is not free to reverse engineer, modify, or redistribute freeware, but there is also the kind of freeware that is disguised as adware or even as spyware.
Remember from about 5 years ago when Gator created a storm of protest. Its GAIN Publishing End User License Agreement stated the user was automatically agreeing with also installing the GAIN AdServer software when accepting the EULA. So, the software license gave the company permission to install software that collected certain identifiable information about web surfing and computer usage. This software came immediately along with the freeware and was installed in the same process. At the end, this resulted in a display of all types of ads on the user’s computer.
Next the EULA mentioned that Gator even unauthorized the use of popular uninstallers for their own tools on which countless people trusted to remove this unwanted stuff from their machines. But also, users were prohibited from using devices like web monitoring programs or similar on the GAIN AdServer and its messages, thus eliminating all possible control. Obviously, such clauses are no longer related to software protection against cracking and were more than a bridge too far for many users.
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