The final Demise of Backdoor.Graybird

News breaking recently for those will enable huge numbers to breath a sigh of relief One of the most prolific malware targeting the Windows platform has been decommissioned. Windows users can breathe more relaxed with the knowledge that the makers of Backdoor.Graybird have announced they abandoned the development of the Trojan horse as of March 2007. According to the data provided by Symantec, Backdoor.Graybird, Backdoor.GrayBird [KAV], BackDoor-ARR [McAfee] is a Trojan horse impacting Windows 95, Windows 98, Windows ME, Windows NT, Windows 2000 and Windows XP.

Graybird can be run without the user's knowledge and enables an attacker to capture screenshots, control the Webcam, log keystrokes, steal passwords and have access to files stored locally. Symantec also explained that the backdoor can be injected into running processed and even passed for other applications. Graybird also features rootkit capabilities, making it less of a tool for remote administration and more of a backdoor.

Of course where one falls often another arises somewhat like a Phoenix so lets not all celebrate too soon.

Information received from www.softpedia.com

Microsoft Windows Genuine Advantage

If you were wondering what it is and should you install it here is a brief explanation. Many people out there may have come across this less than subtle crackdown on illegal piracy of Windows XP and Microsoft Office products. Once installed you find you PC pretty much at the mercy of Microsoft in respect of you receiving any further updates Microsoft started with an ActiveX component to force owners of Windows XP to validate their version before downloading security updates. This was pretty much rendered useless by various workarounds. If you are a legit user there is nothing to fear about having this tool but if you are not you may find your windows being rendered useless.

Password Protection

You would think in this day and age that security would be a topic on every bodies minds when it comes to protecting their valuable data and credentials online. Most of tend to protect ourselves against the well publicized threats of Virus and spy ware and install software to ensure we are safe. Hands up those of you who have a password that uses a name of a pet or a loved one... come on you know who you are fess up!

Well OK I am assuming by the silence its a large number. Some sites will now not accept passwords unless they are of a certain strength.. this means it has to meat certain standards and you would do well to look at this as a guideline even if these are not enforced by the site.

The guidelines can vary a little but will normally be something like:
- at least 8 characters in length
- contain at least 1 number
- contain upper and lower case letters
- contain 1 special character, such as: ! & * % $ @ # +
- be changed at least once a year
- be different for each site you use

this may seem a bit of a hassle but if you want to be protected then you must follow these guidelines. Of course the downside of this is it is more difficult to remember the growing list of passwords.

A Question of Phishing

When you first run IE7 you may be faced with the question of enabling the Phishing filter. This is just a short explanation of what you are doing when you say yes.

The Phishing Filter helps protect you by verifying every site you visit against a database of phishing websites. While this is great for helping you feel more secure online, but the downside is that it is terrible for performance. Every page request has to wait for a response from the phishing database before it appears in your browser so of course this carries a penalty on loading times and if your connection speed is not too fast this can be a critical point. By disabling this setting you can drastically increase the speed of IE7, but be aware that you of course compromise your security. Most savvy users will know a rogue site when they see one so do not need this filter but for the Novices out there it can prevent problem sites loading to your PC. If you want to disable it at a later point you can do so from your Toolbar using TOOLS - PHISHING FILTER - TURN ON/OFF AUTOMATIC PHISHING FILTER.