keyloggers and crap

[Betty]

I am constantly finding ghostkeylogger, webmail spy and modem spy on my systems. I'm not sure where they're coming from....it's driving me batty. Can these programs be installed remotely to my computers? I've been using zonealarm security suite and all of the above have managed to hide from it. I switched to lavasoft's firewall and run advanced system optimizer's spyware detective (which seems to be the only program that detects them). How can I find the source of these programs??

[Daniel ~]

Password protect access to your PC. Give each user lessor rights and their own password....That's a start.

Download and install Startup Monitor from our files.
At each boot it will only allow those programs you've approved to load. It's Tiny, uses little or nor resources and comes Aedan recommended.

The fact that this is recurring means it's a site or person you trust, or someone who uses your puter trusts.

That it's a suit of spy-ware apps may mean someone is interested in you.

When setting up STM say no to any you don't know. If something doesn't work after that, you know to say yes next boot.":O} After installed it will ask if you want it to allow any new programs to load as you install them, very easy to use!
But you have to control access to your install permissions in Users

Also download Spy-ware Blaster, update and enable all protection.

BTW how do you find them? I may not be looking in the right place? ":O}

I'm guessing spy-ware can be remote installed...it's the age we live in! ":O}
as for the modem spy, that's a new one on me!

Which browser are you using these days?

Hopefully someone more knowledgeable will stop by.

Always good to hear from you Betty, sorry your minxed!

[Gizmo]

As Daniel says, it may be someone using your computer that trusts some site that is installing this stuff.

I had a similar problem with my children on our 'play' computer; my youngest in particular simply didn't grasp the concept of NOT clicking 'Yes' to every dialog that popped up. It turns out that many of the games he liked to play came packaged with spyware; that's why the games were free. I ended up doing as Daniel has said; every user on the PC has their own login, with restricted access rights. Nobody can install software except me, so when the kids have a game they want to install, they get me and I check it out before installing it. Yes, it's a hassle, but less of a hassle than cleaning spyware off the darned thing once/week, and then having to blow away and reinstall it once every two months. There are a large number of 'free' toolbars and utilities that you can download, most of which offer a 'percieved' value that is actually near worthless, and the vast majority of which install spyware without telling you.

The fact that you have zonealarm and these other protections in place is good, but they are only as effective as the person pushing the buttons. If you've got someone using your computer who simply clicks 'Yes' or 'Ignore' to every warning dialog they get, then the protections are worthless.

BTW, good to see you again.