Welcome to the PC Fear Factor Disaster Prevention News page. Here you will find important information about new releases of disaster prevention and recovery products, critical updates for your personal computer, problems that are afflicting PC users around the world, and solutions for these problems. This page will be updated often and some of the news posted here is time-critical, so I suggest you check this page daily.

Bonus! If you have purchased PC Fear Factor, you are eligible to receive an automatic notification whenever this page is updated. To subscribe, click here.

Note: Please also visit our Tip of the Week page for weekly disaster prevention tips.

ZoneAlarm 5.0: http://www.zonelabs.com/zadownload

ZoneAlarm Pro 5.0: http://www.zonelabs.com/zapdownload

Zone Labs Customer Support Team

The problems seem to center around conflicts with McAfee and Norton Antivirus software products.

Zone Labs has apparently pulled the update off their web site due to these problems, but that is too late for those of you who already downloaded it and installed it.

Our contact at ZoneLabs states, "We are aware of the user forums, (and) are in the process of gathering information from individual users, and will post a response shortly."

Thank you for bringing this suspicious email to our attention. We can
confirm that the email you received was not sent to you by PayPal. The
website linked to this email is not a registered URL authorized or used by
PayPal. We are currently investigating this incident fully. Please do not
enter any personal or financial information into this website.

If you have surrendered any personal or financial information to this
fraudulent website, you should immediately log into your PayPal Account and change your password and secret question and answer information.

Any compromised financial information should be reported to the appropriate parties.

The scam comes in the form of the following email message. The link contained in the message takes you to a phony PayPal Web site and asks you to enter your user name and password. If you do, kiss your $$$$ goodbye!

From: service@paypal.com [mailto:service@paypal.com]
Sent: Tuesday, May 18, 2004 12:34 AM
Subject: New email address added to your PayPal account
Importance: High

https://www.paypal.com/row/wf/f=ap_email

Thank you for using PayPal!
The PayPal Team

Related article: Sasser Worm Picks Up Steam

Symantec has always made it difficult for users to obtain online support, requiring customers to go through a ridiculous number of gyrations before they can contact technical support. But sometime in the last few months, Symantec decided to hide the online support form from customers, making it all but impossible to obtain free support. 

Fortunately, one of my Symantec contacts gave me the secret combination to the online support page, which I will share with you: 

1. Start at http://www.symantec.com/techsupp/consumer.html
2. Select your product and version and click continue.
3. You will now be on a web page containing more than twenty links, none of which appear to have anything to do with obtaining free online support. Click on LiveUpdate issues.
4. Click on the contact tab.
5. Click on free online support. This will display a form where you can (finally) contact technical support.
    

The latest automatic live update from Symantec (January 7, 2004, at about 4:30 P.M. EST), has caused problems with Microsoft Word. The application takes about two minutes to open.  Here is a temporary solution: Open up your Norton AntiVirus application, click on Options, click on Miscellaneous, and uncheck Enable Office Plug In.  MS Word will now open immediately.

We have spoken with Symantec and they are now aware of the problem and are starting to hear about it from other users as well.  They tell us that the fix may take a day or two to implement.  There is nothing about this problem on Symantec's web site. We apparently were the first people to make Symantec aware of the problem.

If you receive one of these messages, it is NOT legitimate. To educate yourself further, visit eBay's spoof email page.

I back up my system partition to my second hard drive each day. The backup process runs unattended, and automatically reboots my computer into Windows when it is complete.

Unfortunately, sometimes when the computer reboots into Windows, Norton AntiVirus is disabled. To make matters worse, you cannot manually re-enable Norton AV at this point - you are forced to reboot to fix the problem.

The real danger is this: if you do not notice that Norton AV has been disabled, your computer is totally exposed to computer viruses. If you get a lot of infected emails as I do each day, you can kiss your computer goodbye.

To avoid this problem, check your system tray after Norton Ghost reboots your computer to make sure that Norton AntiVirus is enabled.  Here we see how the icon looks when it is disabled:

I have reported the problem to Symantec and they are investigating.

You should use CyberScrub whenever you sell or otherwise dispose of an old computer, or prior to taking your computer into a shop for repair. This will prevent the new owner or computer repair person from recovering sensitive data off of your computer. You might want to use CyberScrub more frequently if you work with sensitive data and want extra protection against computer hackers.

The new version of CyberScrub has a welcome screen that helps new users get started. It also has ten different erasure algorithms, three of which go beyond Department of Defense erasure standards. In addition to having the ability to erase files from your hard disk, CyberScrub 3.0 wipes the file names from your hard disk's directory as well.

CyberScrub 3.0 has a number of other important new features that will be discussed in the near future in a detailed product review on our Product Reviews page. Watch for the detailed review!

CyberScrub can be purchased directly from CyberScrub's web site.  The standard edition sells for $39.95 and the professional edition, which contains the most advanced wiping methods, sells for $49.95.

For detailed instructions on how to use CyberScrub, purchase PC Fear Factor.

Well think again - you may not be!

When you install Norton AntiVirus, it is supposed to set up some tasks in the Windows Task Scheduler to automatically run. Unfortunately, these tasks fail to set up properly in many cases. Thus, you may think that Norton is automatically updating your virus definitions, when it fact it may not be!

Here is how to check to see if you have the problem. Go to Start / Settings / Control Panel / Scheduled Tasks.  One of the tasks you will see is Symantec NetDetect. If you see "Could Not Start" in the status column, your computer is not being updated with the latest virus definitions, and you are exposed to a virus infection.

I was able to fix the problem on my computer by simply deleting the task and recreating it. To recreate the scheduled task, open up Norton AntiVirus, click on Options, uncheck the box that says "Enable Auto Protect", and then recheck the box. Since I did this, my automatic live update has functioned normally.

I also recommend that you create a shortcut to Scheduled Tasks on your desktop and that you check it daily to make sure all of your scheduled tasks are running properly. (Check the last run time.)

For more information on the problem, including other possible solutions, click here.

Of course, if you follow the advice in PC Fear Factor, you will never be in the position to require such help!

If you heeded this advice, you were "rewarded" for your vigilance on February 11, when Symantec's Intelligent Updater trashed the Norton AntiVirus application, corrupting the virus definitions file and leaving customers without virus protection. I was forced to restore my hard disk from my most recent backup to re-enable Norton AntiVirus. Fortunately, I take hard disk backups frequently and was able to do this. Still, this consumed several hours of my valuable time. Those without backups were probably not so fortunate.

Symantec did not admit culpability until February 13. Even then, Symantec buried this admission in their knowledgebase rather than being up front about it and issuing a press release, or publicizing the problem on their home page. The admission from Symantec also stops short of telling users that the failed update corrupted the virus definitions file, leaving customers without virus protection. And the cure that Symantec posted in their admission did not work for me (I had tried it before restoring my hard disk.) I suspect that this is a more serious problem than Symantec is admitting.

This isn't the first time that antivirus software vendors have released virus definition updates that trashed their customers' computers. McAfee stuck it to customers on November 7, 2000 and on December 21, 2000. Symantec did it to customers on July 7, 2000.

From the no-good-deed-goes-unpunished department: Ironically, only those who are must vigilant about protecting their computers from viruses - those that use Intelligent Updater - got creamed by Symantec. If you just let Symantec apply the weekly updates, you did not experience any problem.

It's about time that customers hold these companies legally liable for releasing product updates that create computer disasters. These products are supposed to prevent computer disasters, not cause them. Perhaps a nice class action lawsuit is in order.

Now, an individual is sending messages to eBay customers that appear to come from eBay. These messages tell the anxious eBay customers that their accounts have been suspended and will not be reactivated until they have verified their credit card number and mother's maiden name.  For more information, click here.

The worm, named Livra (Avril spelled backwards) holds the allure of information about the sexy rock star. The work sends out mass e-mails from your address book and shuts down your antivirus and firewall software, making your computer susceptible to other viruses and computer hackers.

Symantec is downplaying the virus, but the folks at Symantec probably don't know who Avril is.  I am picking it to be the most "popular" virus of 2003.

Users of file sharing services like KaZaA are particularly at risk here.

Microsoft released a critical security update to address the flaw on Wednesday, declaring the flaw “critical,” its most severe rating. The patch can be downloaded for free from Microsoft’s Web site.

But there's a catch - the update won't install! I know of five people who have tried to install this critical update and it hangs every time. I suppose Microsoft will issue a critical update for their critical update in the next few days - one that will actually install!

A new piece of spyware, Xupiter, is spreading rapidly on the Internet. Visit our Official Xupiter Page for an expose of the most rapidly spreading piece of Spyware on the net.  Learn:

• What Xupiter is

• How Xupiter gets planted on your computer

• How to keep it off your computer

• How to find out if Xupiter is already on your computer

• How to get rid of Xupiter if it is on your computer

Many of you have received an electronic greetings card from the friendgreetings.com web site.  This greeting card prompts the user to download and install software that automatically does a mass mailing from your address book. Because the software asks your permission for it to perform its mass mailing functions, it really isn't a virus or a worm.  If you cancel the installation of the software, no worm-like mass mailings are performed. 

Unfortunately, most users do not read the fine print that tells them what is being installed on their computer.

For more information on the W32.Friendgreet.worm, click here.

A recent glitch on eBay's web site recently made millions of email addresses for a six hour stretch, making all eBay users targets for spammers and scammers. 

As a result, eBay users have been receiving messages from scammers that appear to be messages from eBay, but in fact are clever ruses to induce you to reveal critical information. These messages say that there has been a security problem on their web site, and they request you to provide new credit card information, as well as your PayPal e-mail address and password. 

(See my recent review of ChoiceMail for how to address this problem.)

CyberScrub

The new release of CyberScrub provides the ability to selectively erase your cookies from your hard disk, retaining your favorites. It also contains support for the Opera Browser and Outlook Mail. 

Meanwhile, the real bugbear worm continues to spread like wildfire, surpassing the Klez worm as the most prolific worm on the Internet.

In September, Microsoft released service pack 1 for Windows XP. This service pack is only for users of XP Home Edition, not XP Professional. This service pack is a compilation of all of the security fixes that have been rolled out piecemeal since Windows XP was initially released. In addition, in contains USB 2.0 support (support for the newer, faster external USB devices), which you might care about, as well as support for tablet PC's and Freestyle PC's, which you probably don't care about. The service pack also fixes a number of bugs in Windows XP (and undoubtedly creates some new ones!)

If you have a pirated version of Windows XP, you will not be able to install this service pack.

Should you install this service pack?

Recommendation: The installation of a service pack to an operating system is a major upgrade, with all of the attendant risks of a major upgrade. After investigating the benefits vs. the risk, I recommend that you install the piecemeal security updates (if you have not already done so) from the Microsoft Windows Update web page, and that you not install the Windows XP service pack unless the aforementioned features and bug fixes are important to you. Here's why.

There are a great many known issues with the service pack. More importantly, 781 real users who have attempted to implement the service pack have reviewed it and shared their experiences on cnet.com, and only 54% gave the service pack a thumbs up. Furthermore, if you read the detailed reviews you will find that implementing the service pack trashed a number of users' systems. In my opinion, a (roughly) 50% chance of success is not high enough to justify upgrading your operating system.

Some 20-20 Hindsight: Many people time their purchase of a new computer to the release of a new version of Microsoft Windows. This is wise, as far as it goes. In chapter 10 of PC Fear Factor, I explain why you should never change operating systems on a computer, and why the best course of action is wait until you buy a new computer to get the latest version of Microsoft Windows. However, you need to take your thinking one step further. Always wait until Microsoft has issued the first service pack for a new version of Windows before you buy that new computer. This way, you get a more robust, stable operating system than the first release. It reminds me of when I was a kid. Back then, car manufacturers made major model changes every two years. You would always buy in the second year of a model, to give the manufacturers a year to work out all the bugs. Now that Microsoft has had a year to work out the bugs in Windows XP, its a good time to buy that new computer.

If You Decide to Install Service Pack 1:  

First, remember the cardinal rule in PC disaster prevention: no good deed goes unpunished. Next, remember that this service pack is only for Windows XP users, not Windows XP Professional users. Before you install the service pack, take a complete backup of your hard disk following the detailed step-by-step instructions in chapter 7 of PC Fear Factor. If the installation trashes your computer, you can restore your hard disk following the detailed instructions in chapter 8.

You can download the service pack if you have a broadband connection, or you can order the CD from Microsoft for $9.95. Be sure to follow Microsoft's installation instructions. Good luck, and drop me a line if you have an upgrade experience that might be of interest to other readers.

Recommendation: Based on the press release, I see no critical reason to upgrade immediately if you are already using Norton AntiVirus 2001 or later. However, when your virus definitions subscription comes due, I always recommend that you purchase and install the newest version of Norton AntiVirus rather than renew your subscription. You can usually purchase Norton AntiVirus on eBay for about the same price as a subscription renewal, and the new package comes with a one year subscription to virus definition updates. Detailed instructions for installing, configuring and using Norton AntiVirus are found in chapter 5 of PC Fear Factor.

A detailed review of Norton AntiVirus 2003 will be provided in the future.

Urgent: If you are using Norton AntiVirus 2000, you should upgrade immediately to Norton AntiVirus 2003 as you are not adequately protected against virus infections.  Learn why in chapter 5 of PC Fear Factor.

Warning: Whenever you apply an update from Microsoft, there is always a possibility that the update will create problems on your computer. In chapter 5 of PC Fear Factor, I discuss the "no good deed goes unpunished" aspect of applying critical updates from Microsoft.

Recommendations: You really don't have a choice here folks. You should apply critical updates from Microsoft because they almost always address security issues that leave your computer vulnerable to hackers, even if you have a firewall. However, because this is a major critical update you should take precautions before applying the update.

If you have a Windows 98 system, I strongly recommend that you take a complete backup of your hard disk before applying the update in the event that the critical updates harm your computing environment. Detailed instructions for taking a hard disk backup are found in chapter 7 of PC Fear Factor.

If you have a Windows Millennium or Windows XP system, your operating system you really don't need to backup your hard disk first because the operating system will automatically create a restore point prior to applying the updates (provided you haven't deactivated this critical feature!)  If the update causes a problem, restore your system to the restore point.  Detailed instructions for using the System Restore feature are found in Appendix A of PC Fear Factor.

Known Problems:  I have applied the update and I have found one problem so far. The new release of Outlook Express intrudes into the turf of antivirus software, and in doing so, causes the following problem.

When the update is installed, you will no longer be able to view certain e-mail attachments such as PDF files. This is because Microsoft has provided (and automatically activated) a security feature that prevents you from accessing "attachments that could potentially be a virus."  In Outlook Express, go to Tools / Options / Security and uncheck this box. Let your antivirus software do this job. Yes folks, once again, Microsoft has intruded onto the turf of other vendors, and done so badly. Chapter 2 of PC Fear Factor discusses other unsuccessful examples of turf intrusion by Microsoft.

Recommendation: If you already have an earlier version of Norton Ghost, there is no need to upgrade unless it is incompatible with your CD writer. If you are buying Norton Ghost for the first time, please read our review of Norton Ghost 2003. Based on our testing, we believe that Norton Ghost 2002 is a far more stable reliable product than Norton Ghost 2003, and that you should only purchase Norton Ghost 2003 if your CD writer is not compatible with Norton Ghost 2002.

Detailed instructions for using Norton Ghost are provided in chapters 7 and 8 of PC Fear Factor.