Use NO VIRUS SCANNER, NO SPYWARE SCANNER and Keep your PC ad free!

I use IE, and have it set to trust most sites. I let all activeX controls signed or unsigned run.

I do not use spyware, and do not use virus scanners.

Often people come over, watch me on my machines (old 1.1 GHz and 850 Mhz CPUs) and they "freak out" because my old pieces of junk run faster than their 2 and 3 GHZ processors back home.

Maybe it's because there is no bloatware bogging my systems down???
Virus's, fraid I miss out on all these? Spyware? Wazzat, never see it??

I've been running like this for about 3-4 years now. I'm still running on my OS that I installed back about 3-4 years ago.

So how to I get around all the spyware and virus software??

Besides having a cheap linksys firewall NAT router in front. I have all my 'physical' desktops rigged so they have no access to the internet. So if my physical computer hardware cannot make it to the net, no virus's, no spyware, no problem.

When we surf out on the net, I use an old version of VMWare to connect to the outside world. The IE on these virtual machines 'trust everything', and I allow all activeX controls in. Once I'm done surfing the net, when I power off the virtual machine, the entire system resets itself back to the beginning. All the active X objects and controls, coookies, spyware, adware are all blown away, and when I need to go out and surf again, it will restart again FRESH.

No more cookies, no more spyware, no more nothing. Just a clean system. It's also nice when company comes over, they can mess around with all the settings they like on the virtual machine, when they leave the settings are reset back.

I haven't updated my machines on the MickeySlop site in years! I don't need all the bloatware security updates. If an update makes the machine run quicker or better, maybe I would take a look at it.

VMWARE is what I consider the 'older way' of doing it.

The issue is you have to keep a duplicate copy of your OS around, which wastes a few gigs of space. As well, since your loading a second copy of the OS on your machine, you need LOTS and LOTS of ram. About 1 GIG of memory works pretty good.

The new software coming out from Altiris that allows you to Virtualize applications sounds much more appealing to me nowadays. I've been experimenting with that as of late. It's not perfect, but I think as time goes on it will get better.

Regards,

----- Robb ------

so your advertising a software?

I'm just outlining how I've been able stop spyware and virus's. Does this break forum rules to discuss this?

Regards,
---- Robb ----

I think that is a legitimate discussion. But are you sure that in this way no virus can reach your computer? Actually, even if on a virtual machine, the viruses will be anyway on your HD, because the virtual machine is a phisical file on the HD. How can you say that viruses or spywares or other can't exit from the virtual machine file and spread to all your machines?

Sounds interesting but I am a bit confused on how it works.

If you go to the web, download a file you need and save it, then the file is erased when you turn off your computer. That doesn't sound like my kind of internet.

No, with VMWare you can selectively access the files that are stored on your "virtual machine" and drag them over to your "real" desktop.

Nice idea, Robb, I was toying with the same notion for some time. Don't have the physical/logical requirements though. I do use a free app called SandboxIE, which acts like your VM contraption, without the hassle of VM sets. I reccomend it to all.

Well, if you're okay with this setup and consider 4 year old VMWare images the best way to sustain the Operating System for eternity, why not?

This is sure a very easy way to make your operating system free of evil bytes.

You could also try the hard way as Microsoft intended to use the Operating System: Using IpSec, hardening templates and not use an administrator account when you're using the system.

I think if you only surf the web, this is an (very uncomfortable) way of doing it.
it would be more easy to create a "no-rights"-guest account on your machine which can do nothing.
what i dislike about the VM style of doing it? well, i use the web for more than surfing: i do online banking via 3rd party software, i have several programs (PC and PocketPC) which do get information (weather, RSS...) from the web - and i want to be able to watch it even if not connected; by resetting your VM all those data will be lost...
well, saving bookmarks and downloads seems to be a bit more harder also with a VM running.
Also, if you use a mail-client like Outlook (not express ), it would be hard to keep the .pst file up to date, containing all your mails and contacts, tasks and appointments, because you would have to save it from the VM to your "real machine" manually each time before resetting the VM.

well, just my opinion...

That's pretty cool

My solution was simpler: I installed Linux
(Well, okay, 'simpler' is arguable )

But dude, if you ever get r00t'ed by like, a Sony CD or something, I'm gonna laugh my head off

people are able to stop spyware and virii's without having to dled av's and firewalls and all that mumbo jumbo. cause they know waht their doing and i guess they're pretty smart at breaking stuff up to know whats inside the programs and so on

Amen!