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How to be confirm if a free software is safe for downloading?

  1. mark
    Staff

    Having had to clear my daughters' machines a couple of times bookmark this page:
    http://www.spywareinfo.com/~merijn/forums.php

    The people there know stuff. Lots of it.
    You can't answer in most of those forums until you really have proved you know precisely what you are doing - and it's hard work just learning let alone guiding others.

    There are many useful links too. It's well worth some of your time.

  2. katm
    Member

    Thanks Mark.

    Bookmarked.

    I've had one run in with malware and it necessitated a complete reinstall of XP. Not something I care to do again. Thank you.

  3. timethief
    Member

    Bookmarked - thanks :)

  4. sanjidabd
    Member

    aw mark! {big smile}

    thanks for "playing Daddy" here!
    much appreciated!

  5. mark
    Staff

    I'm just writing stuff :)

    http://www.pricelesswarehome.org/
    is an excellent site. Free software voted on by real people (none of that 5 star nonsense that some sites have). There is a newsgroup too to follow.

    http://www.pricelesswarehome.org/2007/PL2007SECURITY.php#1.20Anti-Spyware

  6. mymyspacelayouts
    Member

    sanjidabd, later I'll get you a list of the scans I have. I open so many files and go to so many questionable sites and I haven't gotten a virus in ages. And I read on your blog the other day your computer was acting slow after something you downloaded. But after my computer a couple of years ago almost drifted into the great beyond because of viruses, spyware, and malware, I now run every scan each many times a day and all is good now. :)

  7. timethief
    Member

    I don't want to post the url for obvious reasons but there is a site out there that offers skeletons shaped into letters of the alphabet that one can use in logo making. I checked it out and my geek friend checked it out too and we found hidden links to "Nigeria" spam sites in each letter. So even though the skeleton alphabet may look cool for Halloween don't download them.

  8. sanjidabd
    Member

    mmslo,
    please do! there's nothing i'd like better!
    not that i go to questionable sites, but i'd love to d/l more free useful stuff. :D

    tt,
    i'm sure a lot of halloween sites offering skeleton letters are good.

    please let us know the url like this!
    www [dot] example [dot] com

    this way we won't have to have skeleton phobia!

  9. mymyspacelayouts
    Member

    Here's what I have and run each everyday.

    I first had this when it was free and known as Ewido. But now it's a pay version for newer downloads - AVG Anti-Spyware

    AVG Anti-Virus Free Edition

    Spybot - Search & Destroy

    Ad-Aware SE Personal

    Spyware Blaster

    And I try to download most of what I download from http://www.download.com/

  10. atthe404
    Member

    Someone has suggested that the reason there are no viruses in Linux is because it is a small niche and all the hackers are having so much fun screwing Windows users they can't be bothered. Not true. No executeable file of any description will run on a Linux system at all until it is activated by the computer systems admin or root user who need to alter the file permissions first. It is simply not possible to send viruses to Linux systems. Hence we not faff about with hideous anti virus programs eating our systems resources or indeed firewalls. They are just not part of our way of life.

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