CounterSpy, iHateSpam and Sunbelt Kerio Personal Firewall coupons

By terry 1 Comment

Update 2010 – This blog entry was originally posted in 2006 – folks, blogs are posts at specific dates. There was a 2008 – that’s “8″ — post – and, of course, that code has expired now, too.]

– original post –
Sunbelt has an unadvertised coupon sale that runs until 12 midnight, Eastern Standard Time, December 31, 2006:

* Get $5 off a CounterSpy license with coupon code code has expired.

* Get $5 off a Sunbelt Kerio Personal firewall license with coupon code code has expired.

* Get $5 off a license for Sunbelt’s award-winning anti-spam program iHateSpam with coupon code code has expired. iHateSpam is for Outlook and Outlook Express only.

Sunbelt also has great discounts on multiple license purchases (of the same program). For example, 2 CounterSpy licenses are $29.92 instead of 2 times $19.95. Plus, you can use the discount code to get another $5 off your purchase.

Be sure to purchase by December 31, 2006 to get the coupon discount. Coupons have no cash value and are good only at the time of purchase. You can only use the coupon on one license per transaction and only one coupon per transaction.

Filed Under: Anti-Adware, Anti-spam, Anti-Spyware, Firewalls, Intrusion Detection, Windows XP

IE7: Now on Automatic Downloads

By terry 4 Comments

I read a couple days ago that IE7 was showing up on Windows Updates automatic downloads. At first, I believed it. Then, when I checked manually (I have automatic turned off), Microsoft Updates did not show it available for my computer.

This morning, though, my desktop (my only computer that still has IE6) had the “updates available” icon in the status bar.

Sure enough, IE6 was there and waiting…

On that particular machine, I will _not_ install IE7 — but only because I need IE6 to be able to view sites in the browser that the Win98, WinMe, Win2000 and much of the WinXP world will be using.

Since I design web sites, I want to make sure that they look good in Firefox (my normal browser), Opera, IE6 and IE7.

Whenever you install IE7, make sure you have 20-30 minutes for the upgrade process. You’ll think that Windows is installing all over again .

The instructions say to turn off your antivirus and antispyware, since both of those types of programs try to protect Internet Explorer from changes — in this case, the protection would mess up the upgrade. So, I turned off NOD32, CounterSpy and WinPatrol. Since I was safely behind a router, I also turned off my firewall during the installation.
Of course, a reboot is required at the end. Actually, it took 2 reboots on my computers, the changes during startup interfered with my other startup programs.

Filed Under: Anti-Adware, Anti-Spyware, Firewalls, Updates, Web Browsers, Windows XP

CounterSpy Sale ends October 31st

By terry Leave a Comment

The CounterSpy Monster of a Sale is ending tomorrow, Tuesday, October 31st at midnight Eastern Standard Time.

Until then, if you use Coupon Code HALLOWEEN at the time of purchase, you can get one license for CounterSpy for only $13.13 — that’s a huge discount from the regular $19.95 price.

Get CounterSpy Now

Filed Under: Anti-Adware, Anti-Spyware, Coupon Codes, Sales, Uncategorized

CounterSpy Monster of a Deal!

By terry Leave a Comment

Read my CounterSpy Review

Filed Under: Anti-Adware, Anti-Spyware, Coupon Codes, Sales

“Publisher could not be verified” warnings

By terry Leave a Comment

A subscriber wrote me to ask about a warning that she received when she was installing a version of OpenOffice.org. Windows popped up a warning that the "Publisher could not be verified" and asked for confirmation on whether to allow the installation or not.

This is a new Microsoft validation scheme that many publishers of free software don’t want to pay for or in which they don’t want to participate. I believe this showed up with Windows XP Service Pack 2.

Read more in “Publisher could not be verified” warnings

Filed Under: Anti-Adware, Anti-Spyware, Internet Privacy, Intrusion Detection, System Control

Computer Security Software Recommendations

By terry Leave a Comment

My Philosophy: Many people want to pick their most economical solution and prefer an all-in-one anti-virus, anti-spyware and firewall solution. In concept, that’s a great idea. In actual practice, this type of package is not likely to be the best in all the protection categories you need.

Other people want to pick the best of each type program. I’m one of the these folks. Read about my security software choices.

So, I’ve got two types of recommendations: the all-in-one solutions and my picks of the individual products for people who want to pick a program of each type.

Read more in my article Computer Security Software Recommendations at www.TerrysComputerTips.com

Filed Under: Anti-Adware, Anti-spam, Anti-Spyware, Firewalls, Free Trials, System Control, Updates

Screensaver Does Not Uninstall

By terry Leave a Comment

Sometimes free screensavers, smilies and other “freebie” programs aren’t the best choice from a security point of view.

Some install adware or spyware along with them — not all, but some do. Always do some research with Google and/or check with some of your computer-savvy friends before installing.

An easy way to check is a search on Google. Search for the name of the program, in quotes if its a multi-word name, and the word spyware or the word adware.

If you don’t, you may have a challenge cleaning up your system.

Read more in Screensaver Does Not Uninstall

Filed Under: Anti-Adware, Anti-spam, Anti-Spyware, Windows XP

How many spyware items are infecting your computer?

By terry Leave a Comment

Spyware or adware items are continually infecting computers. Most computers have no protection from them. But, more frightening is the frequency of the infections.

From the InfosecWriters web site, “According to a 2004 survey by America Online and the National Cyber Security Alliance, 91% of users questioned were familiar with the term spyware. Only 53% believed their computers were infected, but a scan found that 80% of their PCs had some type of spyware installed on them.” It goes on to say, “…The average number of spyware components per computer was 93 with one computer having well over a thousand.”

What is Spyware?

Butte College (www.bctv.butte.edu/support/spyware.html) offers this definition:

“The term ‘spyware’ is broadly defined as any program that gets into your computer without permission and hides in the background while it makes unwanted changes to your user experience.
Spyware is generally not designed to damage your computer. The damage it does is more a by-product of its main mission, which is to serve you targeted advertisements or make your browser display certain sites or search results.
At present, most spyware targets only the Windows operating system (Internet Explorer).”

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Filed Under: Anti-Adware, Anti-Spyware

Defending Your Computer with WinPatrol

By terry Leave a Comment

One of the tools in my computer defense arsenal is a free program called WinPatrol, which lets me have easy access to control automatically starting programs and a lot more.

Actually, I’ve registered WinPatrol, so I’m running “WinPatrol Plus” with access to their program information database.

I used the free version for several years before I broke down and bought the Plus license. At the time, the only difference was that the Plus gave only access to their program information.

The change was an epiphany. It was like going from a VCR to a Home Theater PC (or even a TiVo®. Like going from dialup Internet access to a cable or DSL connection.

WinPatrol will monitor my computer, if I let it (and I do!), to allow me to block changes that are made to certain Internet Explorer and Windows settings, as well as allowing me to block programs from starting automatically.

Does your computer start up slowly? Do you have a bunch of icons in the Windows Status Bar? Each of those programs took some time to start, each takes some of your RAM all the time and some CPU cycles to monitor whatever they are monitoring, and each takes some time to shut down, too.

Is your computer slow? If your anti-virus and anti-spyware (your ARE running both, aren’t you?) are up to date, the problem usually falls into one or both of these categories:

  • There are too many slightly-valuable or useless programs running all the time
  • Not enough RAM

WinPatrol Plus can give you the information and ability to control those extra programs — and speed up your computer in the process!

WinPatrol is free. WinPatrol Plus is $30 — but, during September’06, the author has made the “Plus” information available to everyone free of charge. Give it a test drive. I think you’ll like it.


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Filed Under: Anti-Adware, Anti-Spyware, Free Trials, System Control
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