I work for a large cable company, and when our customers call up screaming that their "Internet is slow" or offline, it is my job to go to their house and get them back online and working properly again. In 999 out of the last 1000 customers homes I have been to (about a year's worth), I have seen massive amounts of spyware, viruses, hijackers, etc causing the problems. So far, using Spybot, AdAware, CWShredder, Hijack This, and online AV software scans, I have been able to clean all of them. About half the time, after the cleanup is finished, I must also reinstall the networking software - tcp/ip and winsock. So far, I have never *not* been able to clean up a computer. Not one of these customers of ours was aware at all of the dangers, or why their computer was behaving this way. There is a huge, huge gap in between what the common user knows about such pests, and what the security community knows.

[ reply ]

Link to this comment: http://www.securityfocus.com/comments/columns/250/27038#27038