Beware of Trojans bearing Cookies.

[sandysocks]

<p>My internet security software has blocked this site multiple times. I have been picking up viruses and lots of obnoxious crud. Every time I visit, I need a scan. I often pick up around a dozen items. This seems like a crass way to treat subscribers to me. It is not polite to send people here to view my images when I know their computer will get whacked. I guess my question is, can or will photonet clean up its act or should I just forget about it and move on? I am growing weary of this.</p>

[joshroot]

<p>It is a problem we are aware of and are working. We aren't the only site dealing with this and it frustrates us as much as it frustrates anyone. This sort of problem is one of the worst nightmares any site can deal with.</p>

<p>My personal apologies to everyone.</p>

[carbon_dragon]

<p>My security software must be better because I'm not picking up anything I (or my virus and spyware software) can detect. What are you seeing and what are you doing when you do? Is it something in the banner ads or in the posts?</p>

[bobatkins]

<p>It's a problem that's spreading rapidly all over the web. There has been a significant increase in attacks from fake anti-virus trojans and similar adware and scamware.</p>

<p>To minimize risks, keep all your anti-malware software up to date. That means updating daily, not weekly. Malware evolves pretty quickly and what caught it last week may not catch it next week.</p>

<p>It doesn't hurt to run multiple protection programs. I run Avira along with SuperAntiSpyware and Spybot-SD, with Malwarebyte's AntiMalware on line too. I'm guessing it intercepts something every day - and not just from photo.net!</p>

<p>You may be safer running the lastest release of FireFox than Internet Explorer, but you still won't be imune.</p>

<p>As Josh says, we're aware of issues and working actively to minimize risk, but no site can ever give a 100% guarantee that nothing malicious will slip in, especially a site that depend heavily on 3rd party contributed content. That's certainly the goal though.</p>

[Mike Howard]

<p>This site is better at it than many, kudos to you guys in the trenches. The fake anti-virus scourge is really bad right now, and so deadly it usually requires a full windows restore to get rid of. On thing everyone can do to help...if you get a popup, do NOT click the little X in the RH corner to close it. Many of them are fake. Right click on the popup in the taskbar, and close it from there.</p>

<p>Like Bob said, multiple layers of protection. I almost never see any malware any more, I run Avast AV, Spybot, and CCleaner. I get absolutely no popups/malware hits from PNet at all. I am a subscriber, though, so see less advertising in general. Of course, RL is too, so that may not be helping :)</p>

[bobatkins]

<p>I've been hit and infected with the fake AV stuff 3 times on different machines. While it was a bit of a pain to get rid of, none of them required a full restore or OS reload to get rid of them. The solution is not to panic, not to click on anything and browse the web (from an uninfected PC) to get advice on how to remove it.</p>

[jack_welsh]

<p>Was about to post a question about this. What I get is an automatic scanning of my computer on PN only. It has happened several times,but not everytime. Last time, it said I have 25 viruses and need to register with an unregistered version of Vista Security. My virus software says I have nothing on my computer and it's constantly upgrading. Since, the auto scan only applies to PN. And, not other sites. I just ignore it. Glad I looked here first.</p>

[JDMvW]

<p>Although my virus software is not very sophisticated, nothing has showed up on my Macintosh (OSX Leopard) to date. I also use a script blocker on occasion, seen nothing there of concern either. I don't accept most cookies either, but sometimes the combination of a script blocker and denying cookies can bring you to a complete standstill on some sites. I use Firefox and keep up with every update.<br>

Am I just missing the bad stuff crawling all over me, or is it more Windows oriented? Occasionally I do get warnings in email of Windows infections of various sorts.</p>

[Ray House]

I've had the popup four times and it only has happened on Photo.net while using IE8. I am now using Mozilla/Firefox and haven't had any problem for about 4 days. My virus scans show nothing and I hope we are kept informed by those at this site with any new info. Thanks in advance, Ray

[sandysocks]

<p>Wow. I just received an email from someone who got a virus here and seemed rather hot about it. But it sounds to me as if there is something of a crisis in this area. I hope things get better. I am going to look into a couple of things that Bob mentioned. I guess the main impact will be that I visit this site less often and pay more attention to this particular forum. Thanks guys. I really appreciate it. Oh, someone wanted to know what I have been getting. It's spyware, Trojans, cookies. A lot of it came from the forums I visit.</p>

[bobatkins]

<p>Cookies are harmless. Lots of sites issue them for perfectly valid reasons. Even if they track your movements, they don't interfere with the operation of your PC and they can very easily be deleted if desired.</p>

<p>Spyware, Malware, Viruses and Trojans are of course a problem. The current problem seems to be related to Scamware. Basically it's a program that bogs down your PC, stops you running programs and tells you you have a virus and have to pay a particular site $X for their antivirus software in order to remove it. It also hijacks your browser and redirects all web calls through a proxy so you can't get to the internet either. Lots of people fall for the scam, pay the money but they don't get any antivirus software that works and the crap on their system doesn't get removed. It's a scam but a very nasty scam. It doesn't actually harm any data on your PC, it just makes it very hard to run anything until you get it off the system, and it does it's very best to prevent you from removing it.</p>

<p>I got hit 3 times with it (two desktops and one laptop) before I got my security up to par and switched to FireFox.</p>

<p>I'm not smart enough to figure out what the mode of attack is or where the rogue software hides on web pages, but people much smarter than me about these things are doing their best to figure it all out.</p>

<p>All the required security programs are available for free on the web. Look at Malwarebytes, Spybot S&D, SuperAntiSpyware, Avira and AVG. Thay all offer free versions as well as more advanced utilities which you pay for. There;'s also free security software available from Microsoft if you are running a licenced version of Windows XP, Vista or 7. See Windows Defender. Windows comes with a firewall, but you can also use something like Zone Alarm (free version).</p>

[jack_welsh]

<p>Have Windows defender and McAffee. The few times that scanning my computer popped up.I didn't click on anything on Pnet. have pop-up blocker turned on.</p>

[jean_henderson]

<p>Like Jack, I have McAfee. In addition, I use free versions of Spybot and a utility called Advanced SystemCare that includes spyware protection. I'm on Windows XP Pro and use FireFox exclusively. I've been reading not just about popups, but also about advertising on PN, yet I see none of it. Just my 2 cents.</p>