411-spyware.com – The new forum spammers?
It appears to be and to be very annoying that 411-spyware.com or gangs are spamming forums!
It hasn’t just affected us but other known forums on the net. The spammers tend to push a program that is claiming to remove the latest rogues like SpyLocked/SpywareLocked/SpyLocker but infact it’s a program called SpyHunter.
…….hears the penny/cent drop.
Yes the company that pushes SpyHunter is Enigma Software Group. The one that use to be on the bad Rogue/Suspect Anti-Spyware Products & Web Sites list for this reason:
“…Enigma’s SpyHunter anti-spyware application was listed on this page primarily because of the company’s history of employing aggressive, deceptive advertising…”
They hide their installer as a tool that claims to remove rogues then when you download the recommended tool from the said site you get the SpyHunter installer. If you ask me in light of this. They should be re-listed on the list above.
They go on your forum (or public service boards) and have a few different tactics to try and make it look like they are legit users. Or just spam links to whatever rogue is on at the time.
If you are part of the spamming gang, do yourself a favour and stop your posts on each and every forum and public service like yahoo. It doesn’t do you any favours and more importantly the computer users. Especially now people like me blog about it. But feel free to contact me!
If you are a forum owner and wish to discuss this then you can do so in a few ways. Reply with a comment to this article or discuss it on our forum. Computer users with any infection should avoid 411-spyware.com and seek advice from helpers here or at ASAP sites. Oh and Digg it here!
More coverage: Malware Advisor
Update 26th of April 2007, more coverage inlight of Enigma’s press release here visit VitalSecurity. More coverage: Ur I.T. Mate Group
[...] Software Group. Advice from these spammers acting as real users should be avoided at all costs!read more | digg [...]
Would it be considered polite to spam them right back :-)
Spybot thinks SpyHunter is Malware:
Spybot S&D Updates
007-04-11
Adware
++ Zango.AntiSpamBar ++ Zango.Seekmo
Keylogger
+ Perfect Keylogger (2) ++ WideStep
Malware
++ Free-Key-Logger + InetLoader + Smitfraud-C. (2) + SpyDawn + SpyHunter ++ Win32.Agent.ahd ++ Win32.Optix.b
Trojan
+ 1und1Bill.Fake + Hupigon + NumbSoft + Win32.Lager.aq ++ Zlob.MovieBox + Zlob.PrivateVideo + WarezP2P
Total: 373599 fingerprints in 64879 rules for 2804 products.
It would be interesting to know since when.
[...] further coverage of this story: 411-spyware.com – The new forum spammers? Spyware Help: Intent Matters Alot:Part [...]
Don’t answer that. They listed it since the 11th. :)
anti-spyware-101.com is also a clone of 411-spyware.com and 411-spyware-remove.com…
It is pathetic isn’t it. Hopefully they start cleaning up their act soon.
Tuesday is day two of the Five Days of Project Honey Pot Announcements.
Yesterday we announced QuickLinks which allow even more people to help
with the Project. Today we are announcing that Project Honey Pot has
begun tracking a new kind of online beastie: Comment Spammers.
If you’re not aware, comment spammers crept up from the depths in the
last few years. They are robots are running around the internet leaving
their comments on feed back forms, blogs, and forums. The purpose is not
only to drive traffic to the sites when people visiting the forums click
the links, but also to increase search engine rank by increasing the
number of back links to their site.
To learn more about how we’re tracking comment spammers, please visit:
http://www.projecthoneypot.org/5days_tuesday.php
We turned the system on only a little over a week ago and already have
caught more than 600 unique IPs engaged in comment spamming. We expect
that number will dramatically increase over time. If you haven’t done so
already, install a honey pot or add a QuickLink to help trap comment
spammers. If you’ve already installed a honey pot there’s nothing you
need to do. The form traps necessary to catch comment spammers are
likely already being delivered to your honey pot. Login to your account
and check out your Dashboard to see what comment spammers you’ve helped
catch.
As always, if you’re prefer not to get these updates, simply login to
your Project Honey Pot account and switch off notification emails under
the settings tab. Stay tuned for our big mid-week announcement tomorrow.
Until then, make sure to let your blogging friends know there’s a new
way to track comment spammers and we need their help!
The Project Honey Pot Team
=============================
Project Honey Pot
c/o Unspam Technologies, Inc.
1901 Prospector Avenue, Suite 200
Park City, UT 84060
Hi Folks!
Just wanted to share my new experience.
If your system denies to start due to an error related to missing HAL.DLL, invalid Boot.ini or any other important system boot files you can fix this by using the XP installation CD. Simply boot from your XP Setup CD and enter the Recovery Console. Then run “attrib -H -R -S” on the C:\Boot.ini file and remove it. Launch “Bootcfg /Rebuild” and then Fixboot
Cheers,
Carl