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Computer newbies: Do I have a hacker?
Do I have a hacker?
by golden1 - 3/18/08 5:28 PMSeveral things have occurred in the last week.
1. There were messages in my spam filter with nothing in the subject line. I deleted
them. I got a few more today.
2. I got 4 messages in my email today entitled: Notification of undelivered
messages. I opened one and it also had nothing in the subject line. I deleted them.
3. A couple days ago, (I am on dial-up) when I tried to disconnect I couldn't. I got a
message that there was another user with programs still running. I am the only user.
I finally did C/A/D to get out. I checked this one out on google. And from what I
read this could have just been a MS program problem. However, with item 1 and 2,
I am wondering if I have a hacker?
I use XP.
Comments will be appreciated.
Questions. . .
by Coryphaeus - 3/18/08 5:32 PM In reply to: Do I have a hacker? by golden1What AV software are you running? Have you run a scan lately?
What Spyware blocker program(s) are you running? Run a scan lately?
Hackers don't mess with dial-up.
Do I have a hacker?
by golden1 - 3/18/08 5:57 PM In reply to: Questions. . . by CoryphaeusI use Norton Virus and Firewall and MS Firewall, that's all.
I scan weekly, and update virus daily. If I suspect anything I scan right away.
If hackers don't mess with dial-up I don't plan to upgrade!
Two firewalls?
by MarkFlax
- 3/22/08 3:11 AM
In reply to: Do I have a hacker? by golden1
You said, "I use Norton Virus and Firewall and MS Firewall".
It is not a good idea to use two firewalls. They can conflict and prevent connections as they fight each other. The Windows Firewall should have been disconnected by Norton's firewall. Check in your Control Panel > Security Center to see if the Windows Firewall is off. If not, turn it off. Norton's firewall is plenty if you know how to order it around, 
Spam email is, unfortunately, inevitable, but there are things you can do.
1] Never open email from senders you do not recognize. Even previewing such emails means they are opened. Emails can send back messages to the sender once opened to tell them that they have found an active email address.
2] Delete such emails immediately. Make sure you have no rogue email addresses in your Address Book/Contact List.
3] Do not preview emails. Goto View > Layout and turn off the Preview Pane.
4] Never give out email addresses in forum posts or elsewhere where anyone else can read them. Forum bots, (robots), trawl forum posts to pick up email addresses for spamming.
You mention you are on dial-up and another member suggested you may have a dialer. These are insidious little programs that get downloaded and installed without you knowledge. They dial-up instead of your normal DUN, (Dial Up Network), to a premium line number, and can cost you a fortune in telephone bills.
To ensure this does not happen do this;
1] In the Control Panel > Network and Internet Connections, select Internet Options and click the Connections tab. Make sure the "Never dial a connection" is selected. This ensures that Internet Explorer does not automatically dial a connection when you open it.
2] Open "My Network Places" and make sure you can see your network connections. under "Dial-up", if you have more than one DUN, ie your own DUN then any others you don't recognize), delete the others by right clicking the entry and selecting Delete.
3] Right click your own DUN and select, "Set as default connection".
4] Right click the same DUN and select "Create shortcut". A warning message will display telling you you cannot create a shortcut here, but do you want it on your Desktop? Click Yes. Whenever you want to connect to the internet you then double click this icon on the Desktop and it will display the number it is about to dial. That way you are in control.
5] Right click the DUN again, and select Properties. In the Properties window under the General tab, make sure the "Show icon in notification area when connected" is selected. This places a small icon near the clock of two monitors, to show data transfer.
You do not seem to have any anti-spyware. I don't know what version of Norton you have, but if it does not have anti-spyware options you need to have a separate anti-spyware utility. I would suggest something like AVG's Ewido, a free anti-spyware utility available from here;
http://www.ewido.net/en/download/
After a trial period some bells and whistles will be disabled, but it still remains a good anti-spyware tool.
I would then update both the Norton anti-virus and Ewido's anti-spyware definitions, then run a full scan with each in turn. If your computer is otherwise running well, I would turn off System Restore before doing the scans to delete any restore, (backup), files, as viruses and spyware can hide in those backup files. Then run the scans, then turn System restore back on and create a Restore Point.
How to turn off System Restore
You need to ensure your Windows is fully up to date. Difficult I agree on a dial-up, but still necessary I'm afraid. Hackers do not like dial-up connections, but there is still the risk of viruses and spyware.
I hope this helps.
Mark
Good advice for Golden1, thanks!
by JCitizen - 3/22/08 8:35 AM In reply to: Two firewalls? by MarkFlax
On my honeypot Spybot Search & Destroy has beat AVGantispyware hands down. It has rootkit capability now with the new version featured here on download.com. Plus it has an immunizer that keeps the crud from getting on your computer in the first place. The Tea Timer registry protection may conflict with Norton real time protection so should not be installed with the rest of the utility.
I quit using Norton in the NIS 2006 version; It had antispyware capability supposedly but I couldn't find it/or it didn't work. I and my customers have had nothing but heartache from Symantec and any of there junk products. It will take a lot to get me to trust them at all.
Comodo is definity free, they won't even let you pay for it; and it is ten times the firewall Norton is. Newbies should install it with as low alert level as they can so the "learning" process doen't overload them.. It works way better that Kasperski's firewall and the Defense + has way better explainations than Tea Timer, but I run them concurrently as they get along swimmingly.
Do I have a hacker?
by golden1 - 3/22/08 9:01 AM In reply to: Two firewalls? by MarkFlax
Thanks for the info, I will check those items out.
Firewalls are not active threat-finders
by 3rdalbum - 3/22/08 8:07 PM In reply to: Two firewalls? by MarkFlax
I'm not sure about the specifics of Windows, but firewalls shouldn't "fight eachother". They are just passive programs that "drop" (block) incoming socket connections if they are not on the list of things you want to allow.
Antivirus programs can fight eachother as they are actively seeking out threats (and might erroneously identify eachother as threats!); but firewalls just focus on incoming data from the internet.
Having said that, there's no point to running multiple firewalls. The first firewall will drop all incoming connections. The other firewall(s) will, of course, not recieve any incoming connections as they've all been dropped by the first firewall! So they will do nothing.
It is industry wide accepted, in the IT business, that you .
by JCitizen - 3/22/08 8:32 PM In reply to: Firewalls are not active threat-finders by 3rdalbumcannot have two firewalls or two anti-virus or two registry/process guards(generally). I have had to clear customers of disasters when they have attempted this. All I can glean from my experience is that the conflict that can happen when the executive tries to execute two operations at once in the CPU can delay that thread execution long enough for the malware to gain control of the processes at a higher level of the process stack.
Most conflicts become obvious and noticeable immediately upon install or activation. Some are never noticed untill it is too late. I have a lot of trashed hard drives in a pile as testiment to this.
If your talking about blockers that operate by adding registry hacks that keep malware from installing then yes. That would work very low in the 1st or 2nd layer - but todays threats need more than this for session control and statefull packet inspection.
Nothing to worry about, IMHO
by 3rdalbum - 3/18/08 11:57 PM In reply to: Do I have a hacker? by golden1Recieving spam is just the digital equivilant of recieving junk mail. When you get junk mail in the letterbox, it's really just companies trying to market products to you; they are not trying to plant bugs into your house Everyone receives spam unless they have a spam filter in place, and it's safe to ignore.
Sometimes, spammers send messages saying "Notification of undelivered messages" or something similar, to try and get you to open them and read the contents.
In other cases, a spammer will put a random e-mail address from their database in the "From" part of their e-mails. If the destination address doesn't exist, the "from" e-mail address will get an "undelivered mail" message. This is also normal, and only indicates that spammers have your e-mail address. They can send such e-mails from anywhere.
Windows XP is a multi-user operating system. Even if you are the only real human being using the computer, Windows itself runs certain programs as different "users". If one of those programs is accessing the internet connection, that would explain the error message.
Everything that you've described sounds quite harmless, even in combination. Although crackers do exist, they tend to use their time and effort to hit big targets rather than small ones. The thing you would have to watch out for is malware and viruses; but even so, nothing you've said today indicates the presence of these on your computer.
So, nothing to worry about at the moment. However, you did the right thing by asking for advice. Lots of my friends have viruses on their computers but simply don't care. If you see your computer behaving in a way that appears to be abnormal, don't hesitate to send another message to these forums and we'll tackle it for you!
Thanks for the info.
by golden1 - 3/19/08 8:43 AM In reply to: Nothing to worry about, IMHO by 3rdalbumYou made me feel better! I am very particular about my computer. I don't even let other people use it. So when something unusual happens, I get paranoid. LOL
RE: Do I have a hacker?
by kevanatkins - 3/21/08 9:33 PM In reply to: Do I have a hacker? by golden1You might have a dialer which dials 1800 numbers so they can make money of the expensive fees. That's one hypothesis I have for the modem not disconnecting. If you have a DSL or Cable connection this doesn't happen. Dial up is more vulnerable in that sense. This dialer could have another Trojan as well. Last time I got a Trojan I just used system restore and took it back before the problem. Also consider updating the definition file in Norton.
I hope this helps. Happy computing.
-Kev
Do I have a hacker?
by golden1 - 3/21/08 9:47 PM In reply to: RE: Do I have a hacker? by kevanatkinsThanks for the info!
Download Spybot Search & Destroy from download.com and ....
by JCitizen - 3/21/08 11:15 PM In reply to: Do I have a hacker? by golden1Comodo Firewall Pro (both free) but small donations to PepiKM software are encouraged. Do a complete scan in safemode with your system files unhidden and restore turned off.
After you delete the mess Norton left behind. It wouldn't hurt to get CCleaner to clean up the rest of the mess. Then seriously consider getting rid of Norton. Almost all of my customers have become Norton victims since NIS 2004 including me and it has been a real nightmare recovering from all that every since..
The only easy way to get Norton's crap out of the registry is to get Jv6 to finish cleaning out the Symantec tentacles. Sometimes even a thorough manual delete will miss something.
Do I have a hacker?
by golden1 - 3/22/08 8:45 AM In reply to: Download Spybot Search & Destroy from download.com and .... by JCitizenThanks for the info.
Don't just go by our suggestions...
by JCitizen - 3/22/08 11:22 AM In reply to: Do I have a hacker? by golden1Reading the USER reviews and looking at how many people download a particular utility or another is very wise at download.com(which is part of CNET of course).
I rely more heavily on user reviews; but I've found that if a utility is very effective and popular you will find somebody who thinks it stinks. Just reading the review will weed out the cry babies; as I am sure you can tell the difference. Especially if you look at the replys to negative reviews; this is a valuable learning experience.
That way you don't have to repeat the misery of others.
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