Who Really Controls Your PC?

Increasingly, a phantom army of marketers, hackers, and virus writers does.

A couple of us were visiting a partner company the other day, watching a demo in the conference room. Our partners were trying to show us pages on their development Web server. Often what they got instead were pop-up ads that had no relation to their site.

This was especially surprising because a development server--where Web designers troubleshoot new pages--should not have live advertising. The culprit, as you've probably guessed, was an ad-serving program that had sneaked onto our partners' PC during a recent download, probably when someone clicked 'Install' or 'OK' without reading the fine print. Ever since, the program has periodically tossed up random ads.

This was only a mild annoyance, but it exemplifies a serious and growing threat. In the early days of personal computing, nothing made its way onto your PC unless you or the manufacturer put it there. You had control of your PC.

That's no longer the case. Even if you're vigilant about deterring intruders, as most PC World readers are, your computer is under constant attack from parties who want to divert it to suit their own agenda.

Marketing Onslaught

Marketers are the most obvious intruders, and the aggressive methods that some of them use bother many people. After Editor Harry McCracken wrote in this column two months ago about his concern over intrusive ads on PC World's own Web site, we received an outpouring of agreement from readers (for a sample, see Letters).

Marketers know that their tactics can be annoying, of course, but the temptation to use ads such as pop-ups and pop-unders is powerful. Witness the success of X10's camera ads: In some recent months this pitch was seen by one in three Internet users, according to Media Metrix.

Spam is another (relatively) harmless intruder that many of us find irritating. Viruses, on the other hand, can do serious and irremediable damage. And anyone who runs a firewall is familiar with the many pings that even small systems get daily; most are benign, but some are from hackers seeking a way in.

The popularity of free downloads and file swapping introduces another potential source of intrusions. The file-sharing site Kazaa took heat in April after reports that 20 million copies of its downloaded client software contained technology that could take over a PC's processor and storage space for a planned distributed-computing network called Altnet. Kevin Bermeister, president and CEO of Brilliant Digital Entertainment of Los Angeles, which created the technology, disputes that. He says the code is there only to enable sponsored search results on Kazaa, much like those on Yahoo and Google. To join Altnet, Bermeister adds, you will have to download an additional component that lets you choose how much of your PC's power you want to share--and that won't be offered until "July or later." Nevertheless, the incident underscores the potential for misunderstanding or even abuse.

To regain control of your PC, you need the tools Robert Luhn and Scott Spanbauer review in "Protect Your PC." You'll learn about utilities to stop spam and detect freeloading "spyware"--programs that slip into your PC and track what you do. You'll also find reviews of the top antivirus packages and firewalls. "These products make similar claims, but only rigorous testing can identify the most effective," says Associate Editor Seán Captain, who helped edit the story. Throw in our May feature on ad-blockers ("It's an Ad, Ad, Ad, Ad World"), and you'll have a safer system. But stay tuned: The battle for control of your PC is just starting.

Kevin McKean

Kevin McKean (kevin_mckean@pcworld.com) is editorial director of PC World.

Tell Us What You Think: Rate this issue--you could win $500. You'll need your subscriber number from the mailing label to take this survey online. The Web site explains the official rules and also how to participate in the drawing if you're not a subscriber. You can enter from June 3 through June 28, 2002.