Like I Said, Yahoo is Terrible

For several years now, I have been attempting to steer clients clear of Yahoo and anything related to Yahoo. Aside from the irritating interface of frames buried within more frames covered in ads, Yahoo has had several security breaches over the years, losing well over 1,600,000,000 usernames and passwords in total. At its peak, Yahoo was once worth over one hundred billion dollars before being bought out by Verizon for a mere 4.8 billion.

Yahoo officially solidified its position as one of the worst protectors of user data on Wednesday when they revealed in a press release that data from more than one billion user accounts had been stolen in 2013. This is separate from the breach which occurred in September, when it was announced that 500 million accounts had been compromised.

Having warned one of my clients for several years on his business’s use of Yahoo email accounts, I finally received the inevitable call when emails had been sent out from his account which he did not send. This particular hack resulted in some pretty specific emails being sent to people on his contacts list requesting things such as account numbers and wire transfers. Being that it was coming from his email address, users on his contacts list assumed the honesty and accuracy of the request and granted the hacker the information they requested.

I am now assisting my client in not only purchasing and setting up a proper domain name, but an email account for the aforementioned, and moving all contacts and emails from his Yahoo account to his new account. I have also set up a secure forwarder so that he does not miss any emails over the next few months before completely cutting Yahoo off.

AOL has also been on my list of domains to avoid and it too has been the victim of several data breaches. Its interface is more loaded than a Chinese newspaper, with so many windows, marketing ads and clickbate, just trying to check your email becomes an attack on the senses. Aside from that, its users have been on the unfortunate receiving end of such a hackneyed stereotype of being aged troglodytes for so long that it seems even AOL itself has begun to pray upon this potential vulnerability.

Upon using the website or the AOL Desktop program, the user will find several mycleanpc-esque ads that are actually from AOL. Aside from this blatant use of scare-tactics pertaining to issues which have been debunked again and again, a class action lawsuit was filed against AOL in 2012 regarding Support.com and AOL's Computer Checkup software, which used software developed by Support.com. The software was reported to often claim illegitimate problems with users' computers and would then offer to sell them software to fix the plethora of non-existent problems —for which AOL allegedly charged $4.99 a month and Support.com $29. Both AOL, Inc. and Support.com, Inc. settled on May 30, 2013 for $8.5 million.

Being that Google's top related search suggestions when researching AOL is "Does anyone still use AOL", "Do AOL email addresses still work" and "Does AOL still exist", it would become apparent pretty quickly that AOL is not exactly the top choice of email service providers. Knowing of how god-awful their service is as a whole, AOL has been known to ignore clients’ demands to cancel service and have also been known to send out reoccurring bills which clients never needed to pay before. The New York Attorney General's office began an inquiry of AOL's customer service policies, revealing that the company would actually reward employees who purported to retain subscribers. I have actually had several clients who would receive monthly small bills from AOL and never knew why. Due to the small amount and the client assuming it was something they needed in order to use their computer, they would often just pay these bills and never question it. That is, until I would come along and find that they were pretty much paying for nothing or that they didn't even use any of AOL's services anymore. 

I wanted to provide a concise source of information for those who are still using these services and could never get a straight answer as to why they shouldn't. It seems like a lot of people have been told that they shouldn't use these services, but not by those armed with any useful, compelling information. "Because, I mean, just look at it!" isn't a good reason for someone to uproot from something they feel is tried and true. Further, most of these users, if not all, are under the impression that they are so invested in the service that they could never leave - that all of their contacts, emails, and future emails would be lost. Though AOL and Yahoo would really like you to continue believing that, even taking steps to make it a rather needlessly irritating process to move on - I can tell you from experience that it is not only possible, but relatively painless. For you, anyway. For me, well....That's what I get paid for. 

PCMatic - Scam or Legit?

PCMatic.com

As soon as I saw this commercial, I was instantly reminded of the MyCleanPC and/or MaxMySpeed programs. I wrote a blog entry about it awhile back and it has actually gotten quite a few hits: http://mooreithelp.blogspot.com/2012/07/mycleanpccom-scam-or-legit.html

I’ve been meaning to write something regarding all these programs which claim to magically and quickly fix all your computer problems. Not only do these programs usually cost half of what real Internet Security programs cost, they claim that they will even make repairs and tune up a computer, making it run faster than ever. Many of them, including PC Pitstop PC Matic, claim that you will “never get a virus again” which is impossible. These registry cleaners and optimizers claim to speed up your computer by finding and removing orphaned and corrupt registry entries that are responsible for slowing down system performance. Unfortunately, the fact is that there is no statistical evidence to back such claims. These advertisements are borderline scams intended to goad users into using an unnecessary and potential dangerous product. I would not trust any results such programs detect as problematic or needing repair nor recommend using the options to fix them.

The registry is a crucial component of Windows, storing information and settings for all hardware, software, users, and preferences - basically the makeup of the Windows Operating System, to a degree. So, these programs which can aggressively scan and make violent changes to this system can render the system inoperable. Some may argue that these registry cleaners are required for specific types of infections, and that is true. However, improperly removing registry entries can make the removal process more difficult if your computer becomes infected. Removing malware related registry entries before the infection is properly identified (and steps taken to remove said infection) can contribute to system instability and even make the malware undetectable to removal tools.

I could delve into benchmark testing and detailed explanations as to how PCMatic and programs like it are basically advertising bold faced lies, and how its promises and "features" are borderline impossible, but to be frank - its not worth it. This program is just like all the other magic wands. Quickly, if you are willing to dig around the PC Matic web site, you will eventually find information about Super Shield, the proprietary real-time technology component to PC Matic. That page goes into a little detail about their use of a "white list" approach in addition to a "black list". Not mentioned is the company's use and explanation of its heuristic and behavioral detection technology. Aside from the numerous complaints filed against the company, the vendor's website doesn't specifically say how the product “protects against modern security threats”. They also fail to tell customers that their product has high false positive rates.

Expecting results similar to the MyCleanPC.com scams, I didn’t bother to do a scan on a test system like I did in MyCleanPC.com - Scam or Legit. I did, however, find that someone did it for me and it was exactly as I expected. Joe53 of SpywareHammer.com reported that the program found hundreds of "bad" registry entries on his system (which was working perfectly well), that his system had TCP connection problems (when he had no internet connection problems), extreme fragmentation of his hard drive (despite his regular use of Diskeeper), identified his System Restore files as "junk files", and suggested he delete them and identified that all his internet settings (HTTP, TCP, DNS et.al.) as needing to be optimized (despite the fact that SpeedTest measurements showed his connection and ping times to be well within parameters.)

Now,

Many people are starting to say that most of the negative press is from several years ago and that PCMatic has been perfecting itself over the past 4 years or so. To that, I respond with this very same article. The fact remains that this is a PRODUCT that claims to fix all your computer problems! It's half the price of a traditional, reputable AV and yet claims that it will not only REPLACE your Antivirus program, but that you will never get a virus again! The features and claims are so ridiculously silly, its not even worth a detailed examination. 

Internet Security in 2015

I got a phone call a few days ago from a young lady whose file extensions were all replaced with ".ECC". The folders where said files resided now all included a new text document titled "HELP_RESTORE_FILES.txt". This sounded like another variant of the kinds of infections I encounter all the time. However, after running through my usual process, I found that these files werent actually "infected" per say, but rather that they were encrypted by a virus called EccKrypt.
This was a new one for me, and basically boils down to that age old technician's warning;

BACK UP YOUR FILES!!!

The computer is now an appliance to which almost every American owns. With Windows still dominating the market, big businesses are seeing the demand and the opportunity for profit in promising advanced protection from the big bad hackers. Now we see ads for products like the FixMeStick, MyCleanPC.com, Win Cleaner, and MaxMySpeed.com - and just like everything else in big business - its all one big lie. 
No antivirus solution is completely infallible, and even with the latest and greatest installed, one can still get infected. Further, removing infections is often not the concern! What about identity theft? None of the aforementioned "protection" products offer real time scanning or any form of firewall, and in the case of my new client, the damage has been done! Even with a squeaky clean PC, her files were encrypted - How is a Registry Cleaner going to take care of that?!

So call a mechanic for your car, a roofer for your house, and a tech for your computer. Ensure that you have the best protection in place and the best backup in place. Call MooreITHelp.com at 617-396-7044, or shoot me an email at Help@MooreITHelp.com.