WinDefender Concord CA

WinDefender is a Poser

There isn’t anything more frustrating than thinking you are buying something legitimate and helpful, only to discover that you have inadvertently been duped by snake oil salesmen with mal intent. Sometimes it is easy to spot these shady products and characters; sometimes you would really have to be overly keen and vigilant to be able to avoid them. WinDefender is a program that catches a lot of people by surprise. These are people who think they are downloading Microsoft’s Windows Defender for Vista, a free antispyware service offered by a legitimate company. In actuality, they are downloading WinDefender, a rogue antispyware program that will do nothing but harass you, steal your money, and damage your computer.

In some respects, WinDefender is rogue antispyware like any other. It pretends that it is a helpful program that will help protect your computer against malicious programs. It generates a usually false list of supposed “threats” that it found after scanning your system and tries to scare you into buying its full version by bombarding you with alarming pop ups. It slows down your computer’s processing speed, automatically updates itself by connecting to the Internet without your permission, and invites other malicious programs onto your system. Buying the full version achieves, at best, nothing but the loss of your money; at worst, your identity and credit card information is stolen.

In other respects, WinDefender takes a novel approach to stealing from you and lying to you. There is its name which, as mentioned, is uncomfortably close to a real, truly helpful product. There is its method of infection – it most commonly infects a computer when the user tries to download video codec which are actually Trojans in disguise. Then there is its scare-to-sell tactic. Instead of just trying to intimidate you into buying only the full version of WinDefender, you are also harassed to buy the full version of something called “Total Secure 2009,” which is yet another full rogue antispyware program in disguise. These people are clearly out for blood.

Obviously, steps need to be taken to bring WinDefender down. Innocent people are getting infected here. The most helpful way of achieving that goal may simply be to warn people with Windows Vista about the perils of trying to download Windows Defender. Or to warn people trying to download video codec that what they’re getting may be malicious fakes. The problem with simply warning people is that by the time everyone has actually heard, the software has already taken on a new name and face to avoid detection.

A perhaps more effective tact may simply be to invest in quality antispyware that will ferret such dubious programs out of hiding. It is important that the program chosen is highly ranked, backed by the support of well-respected computer and business authorities, and stands behind its service every step of the way. It is also important that the software you choose provides a 100% guarantee that it will catch all malware trying to weasel its way onto your computer, all the time. This is a crucial component as many antispyware programs, while legitimate, are unable to catch more than 75-80% of any given malware trying to infect you. Find such a program and it won’t matter how crafty programs like WinDefender get, as you’ll have all the protection you’ll need.

To scan your pc for free and find out if you have WinDefender click here.

Carl runs a site devoted to helping you rid your computer from all sorts of spyware and malware at http://www.spyzooka.com/

Article Source: http://www.articlesbase.com/security-articles/windefender-is-a-poser-852225.html