LETTERS From CAMP Rehoboth |
CAMPOut:Fay's Rehoboth Journal |
by Fay Jacobs |
The spy that bugged me...
Now I'm being spied on. And not by John Ashcroft, who I would expect to do so. No, I'm being spied on by my own household computer. Although Ashcroft may have my file on his desk as well. Now before you call me completely paranoid, I have to tell you that this was NOT to be my topic for this column. In fact, I was surfing the net for confirmation about a factoid I wrote about Cicadasthose beady-eyed disgusting shrimp-sized bugs that have descended on the D.C. metro area in recent weeks. I was set to tell you that there are about a million reasons why I love that I moved to the beach, but right up there, especially this month, is that I missed the attack of the 17-year locusts. I'm delighted that the vermin don't cross the Chesapeake Bay and invade Delmarva. Fear of bridge back-ups? Truth is, I was going to relate my run-ins with the swarm of Brood X Cicadas (not to be confused with Generation X, which swarms in Dewey) that came out in both 1987 and way back in 1970. Point of fact, I came out in 1980, having nothing to do with locusts. But those tales will have to wait. A funny thing happened on my way to the Cicada story. My computer was invaded by spyware. I went to Google to search for Cicadas and I got an eyeful of pop-up ads, followed by strange grinding noises from my hard drive and then my computer went on a slow-down strike. I could eat my dinner, and in fact, did, while waiting for Google to do a search. I came back and tried to get my e-mail but the machine worked like it had swallowed a fistful of Quaaludes. When the thing worked at all it was with pop-up ads for casinos, prescriptions by mail, liposuction clinics, and methods of enlarging an organ I do not have. "You have just won!!!!" "Get the drugs you need!" "Sweepstakes Winner!!!" and my favorite, "Be Bigger and she'll love you!" Boy, are they barking up the wrong tree house. I tried to close the ads and the computer froze up like a lesbian in a room full of Promise Keepers. Did this have something to do with the wireless cable doodad under my desk that's been blinking at me ever since I threw over dial-up for broadband? "Hello, Comcast? My computer gets popped up, then pooped out." "Hmmmm. It sounds like spyware has invaded your system." My god, do I call Bond. James Bond? Do I go to the C.I.A.? Rocky and Bullwinkle? The tech support guru explained that my computer had a bad case of this spyware phenomenon. It's not a virus or a worm, mind you, but software that watches what you are doing and zaps you with ads against your will. I'd rather have a virus. This feels more like a rapist. How the hell did this happen? "I have no idea," said techguy, "but it happens a lot." "But my machine was fine yesterday." "Yeah, it can happen in a minute. One click, one piece of spam, you never know." Then he told me to go to Download.com and find a free software called Spybot, download it and run the program on my machine. If the instructions hadn't come directly from Comcast, I would have been very wary, indeed. But I checked out the site, downloaded the program and ran the "Search and Destroy" feature. I would have laughed at the video game nomenclature if I hadn't been so pissed off. But here's the shocker. The Spybot program located 66 different spyware programs that had invaded my computer between noon yesterday and today and were lurking there just waiting to help me enhance my breasts. Or my bank account. Or my sex drive. In the ten minutes it took to seek all the spies and destroy them, I learned spyware names like Scratch and Win (at least it wasn't scratch and sniff), Gratisware (thanks for nothin'), FunWeb (who says?), I-SPY (does it come with Bill Cosby?), ICU2 (not if I see you first), and my favorite, Usucker (exactly). We're all suckers, sucked in by this marvelous technology and then at the complete mercy of tech support crews who are now more valuable to us than doctors or plumbers. When I ran my first search and destroy mission and found all those intruders I realized that the proverbial once was not enough. Five minutes after cleaning my computer off, the damn things were back again, popping up in my face with their sleazy, sneaky messages. Aha! Following search and destroy, I had to immunize. That's right, I had to run part two of the program and inject my computer with anti-spyware serum. The program had to immunize my computer against all known bugs, viruses, Trojans, and everything but Whooping Cough. Of course, part of my weekly routine will now include updating my spy software for new bugs and running my weekly search and destroy missions. Ugh, and I had vague hopes that my life was getting simpler. The good news is that there seem to be dozens of programs available to combat this twenty first century problem (some solutions for free, some, of course, for hefty fees). Just so you know, spyware can also be called adware or malware. This malicious programming consists of files that allow the people who think them up to snoop on your browsing activity, see what you purchase and send you "pop-up" ads they think you will love. They are sadly mistaken if they think that everybody who surfs the CAMP Rehoboth site (or Matt Drudge, or CNN.com) wants their member enhanced. Or needs Cialis. Or wants a new mortgage. Okay, here's the thing. I just realized that I hate pop-up ads worse than I hate Cicadas. I'd rather be bombarded by flying beady-eyed shrimp (which I was, on Charles Street in Baltimore, in my Mustang Convertible, in 1987, but I didn't get to tell you all about it because of malware!!!) than bombarded by virulent and disgusting pop-up ads on my own home computer. And the government wants us to use completely computerized voting for the November election? I'm even more opposed to that idea than I was yesterday, before a brood of spyware infested my computer. I'd rather walk ankle deep in dead Cicadas (which I did in 1970 in Bethesda, Maryland...) than have to worry that malware and spyware will invade and hijack our critically important upcoming national election. I say bring back paper ballots and number two pencils. I say we should all demand paper back-up and whatever other measures are necessary to make sure that computer hackers, netspys, software terrorists or virtual Cicada swarms don't make technological fools out of us all. Spyware. It's a brand new fear factor. Trust computers? I'd rather eat a Cicada. Fay Jacobs can be reached at www.fayjacobs.com. |
LETTERS From CAMP Rehoboth, Vol. 14, No. 7 June 18, 2004 |