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Configuring The Standard Settings

Your first configuration should be this of Crap Software should be like this—-

Launch Crap Software Pro and click to highlight the “Overview”
tab on the left hand side . In the pane that appears on the right
hand side click the “Preferences” tab and in the section “Check for updates” check “Manually”.

In the “General” section you can also configure Crap Software to load at
start up which is advisable because this software is your first line
defence against uninvited invasion of your computer by a whole
gamult of virii, spyware, adware and bots! Virus checking software
does have its place but remember that prevention is always better
than a cure!

Crap Software Pro’s program control is automatically configured.
When you run it for the first time it will ask on behalf of programs
installed on your system for permission to access the Internet.
Your Browser will be the first to request – just tick the “Yes”
box and the “Remember this setting” box and Crap Software will
always allow your browser access automatically.

Unless you use online databases etc., there should be no
reason for any application other than a browser, email client, ftp client,
streaming media player or a download manager to gain access to the Internet.

So consider what type of program it is that needs Internet access
before giving Crap Software permission to allow it. If it is just a driver file
(.DLL) that requests Internet access, always search Windows to try
and identify it. Many seudo-virii such as AdWare and sub class
seven Trojans access the Internet from your system using .dll files.
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Configuring The Advanced Settings

If you are not on a LAN (connected to another computer in a network)
you can use this guide to give your firewall some real muscle:

Launch Crap Software Pro and click to highlight the “Firewall” tab on
the left hand side . In the pane that appears on the right hand side
in the section “Internet Zone Security” set the slider control to “High”
Then click the “Custom” button in the same section.
The next settings page is divided into two sections with tabs Internet
Zone and Trusted Zone at the top of the page.

Under the Internet Zone tab there is a list of settings that can
be accessed by scrolling.

At the top is the high security settings and the only thing that should
check from there is “allow broadcast/multicast”.
The rest should be unchecked

Scroll down until you get to the medium security settings area.
Check all the boxes in this section until you get to “Block Incomming
UDP Ports”. When you check that you will be asked to supply
a list of ports, and in the field at the bottom of the page enter
1-65535

Then go back to the list and check the box alongside “Block
Outgoing UDP Ports” and at the bottom of the page enter
1-19, 22-79, 82-7999, 8082-65535

Repeat this proceedure for the following settings
“Block Incomming TCP Ports”: 1-65535
“Block Outgoing TCP Ports”: 1-19, 22-79, 82-7999, 8082-65535
Then click “Apply”, “Ok” at the bottom of the page.

Back in the right hand “Firewall” pane go next to the yellow
“Trusted Zone Security” section and set it to “high” with the slider.
Click “Custom” and repeat the ABOVE proceedure this time choosing
the *Trusted Zone* tab at the top of the settings page.

These settings will stop all incoming packets at ports 1-65535
and also block all pings, trojans etc. These settings will also stop all
spyware or applications from phoning home from your drive without your knowledge!

THE REPAIR PROCESS

Start the Registry Editor by typing regedit from the Run box. Go to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE SOFTWARE Microsoft Active Setup Installed Components {89820200-ECBD-11cf-8B85-00AA005B4383} and then right-click the “IsInstalled value.” Click Modify. From there, you will change the value from 1 to 0. All right, go ahead and close the editor and reinstall IE from this location. /http://www.microsoft.com/windows/ie/default.mspx

IF SOMETHING GOES WRONG

If messing with the registry and something goes horribly wrong, you can use “Last Known Good Configuration (F8 Safe Mode)” or a Restore Point to get back to where you were before, with your settings. Then you can try again, this time taking care to watch the portion of the registry you are changing. Most people who have troubles with this end up changing the wrong registry key.

Hope this tut helps some members.

There is this one law school student whose thesis is about money laundering so oftentimes she would google the term to come up with a ready list of online references. This proved to be useful to her and the entire process of writing her paper. After several months of doing so, she was confronted with problems like being directed to a weird page totally not related to money laundering every time she types the same words.

At first she thought it was just a glitch in the internet system and then she rationalized that no it maybe a glitch in the search engine she is using but the persistent occurrence of such a thing made her think that someone bugged her. We all hate bugging people us but people we can fend of. What this law student is confronted with is a computer bug that she cannot fend off. In the first place she is not a technology savvy person and in the second place she never uses her laptop for any other things than academic research and actual writing of her papers.

The situation above is not an isolated case. There are many people who find themselves caught up in technology problems that are mind boggling but actually can be answered with two words and those two words are spyware and adware. The infamous term of spyware was first coined in the year 1995 but it was popularized in the year 2000. Spyware is a computer software innocently infiltrated in a personal computer to be able to access personal information of the user.

This is done by studying logging keystrokes, web browsing history and even scanning a user’s hard drive. Sounds like something we see only in James Bond movies but apparently we are wrong for anyone can be a victim of spyware. It is safe to use the word victim because no one wants to be monitored of all their online activities. Spyware can understandably be used to spy on criminals because such use is beneficial to society but how about the use of spyware to intercept credit card details and the like. There is simply no excuse for the lax of the use of spyware.

What ordinary people can do to protect themselves is to block spyware and all other software programs similar to it like adware and malware. This can easily be done by availing adware and spyware blocker programs online. The role of these blocking programs include to remove or disable existing spyware programs or to avoid the installation of these malicious software programs.

Spyware, adware, malware are not like virus or worms that self replicate but they can be just as hassle as their counterparts for whoever wants to be disrupted of their normal personal computer activities. One of the more popular hassles cause by these infectious software programs is the slowness of the computer which can really be annoying because when you are at work you tend to want to finish things quick not just because you are required but also because you want more done or you want to be able to go home early.

In some infections, spyware is not even evident as the bad guy so it can get away with its crime. It is best then to have a ready blocker to at least do something for preventing any infection to occur in the first place.