Sociology Research into Spyware Contraction

[Andre]

Based on my at-work network admin experience (and my
at-home experience administering extended family systems) I
think it's time someone did some social research into what
types of users are likely to install or contract spyware,
adware, and viruses. This research might actually be
helpful in developing software and policies to defend
against this junk.

It seems that some vulnerable systems (Win98 with no
anti-virus or firewall connected via cable broadband) never
have a problem while some very protected systems (Win2000
or XP-SP2 with anti-virus and firewall protection using 56k
dial-up) are constantly experiencing problems.

In my at-work experience, it seems that smokers are
high-risk for contracting spyware. I'm not enough of a
conspiracy theory nut to think there's actually a link
between smoking and PC viruses... but the use-case
implications are striking. What do users with addictive
habits do more commonly that causes them to constantly get
spyware, adware, and viruses?

Sociology Majors of the world... here's an interesting
project worth your time and effort!

 

[Michael Jennings]

What brand or types of cigarettes would that be, or
do you mean reefer, crack and like that? At work.

 

[Bryan]

I have seen this as well! The primary find of mine, is
that women are FAR more likely to drag in ad/spyware than
men. This is based on direct support of several hundred
users at work, by the way.

At home, I swapped CPU's with my wife and daughter when I
bought her SIMS 2 for X-mas, as she needed the horse
power. The absolutely clean machine came up with a dozen
spyware items after only 2 weeks of use, and I never came
up with more than one in 2 weeks when I used the box. My
guess is that the "free" games are to blame here. Women
love those free games. The only thing worse than "free"
games is "free" cursor and "free" screensavers. Women
love that stuff.

Study why women are suckers for a sale (50% Off!!), and
you will understand why women are victims to
spyware/adware.

Primary entry point of spyware/adware for men is porn
sites. Sports related sites probably account for a good
portion as well.

 

[Bill Sanderson]

"free" stuff is definitely one vector for spyware. The other one are
apparently legit sites, such as music lyric sites, that ask you to assent to
a download to enter the site. I've seen major infestations on a machine
where the user went looking for music related stuff--not Kazaa or file
sharing, just reading up on groups and titles she was interested in. Ended
up with so many popups she couldn't get work done, even with the browser
closed.

 

[Guest]

...."but the use-case implications are striking." Well,
to the uninformed maybe.

How about this...If you surf long enough the computer
your are using will pick up spyware and adware. If you
visit certain websites you'll get dataminers. If you get
junk, i.e. spam e-mail, and unsolicited forwards you get
viruses and trojans. Any pattern here other than using
the internet?



Bob

 

[Ron Chamberlin]

Hi Andre,
If something is either "Free" or "Cute", then it's only a mouseclick away.

You need to factor in the badware that can be dumped on you without asking
for it also.

BTW, I smoke and have no adware on my machines.

Ron Chamberlin
MS-MVP

 

[Ron Chamberlin]

Hi Bryan,
I tend to think of it more as being 'equal opportunity'. Of course, the
sites that males and females surf very widely in their contents and aims.

Perhaps what you see in the office is more of a rift between job occupations
and titles than sexes?

I have a client who is female, and disabled and plays the bigger online
sites such as MSNGames, Slingo and Pogo, and she has a zero report in her
spyware and virus scans, so that puts a nick in the theory.

Ron Chamberlin
MS-MVP
..

 

[Guest]

No illicit stuff, as far as I'm aware.

I should note that the correlation isn't 100%, but in
general folks who take smoke breaks (tobbacco) seem more
likely to get SpyWare and Viruses (90% of smokers in our
domain got viruses or spyware, or both in the last 6 months).

The salesperson-to-spyware ratio is high, too (over 50%).

Operations staff and engineering, zero.

 

[Andre]

Ron,

Agreed. I suppose from that persepective, that makes this a
much less "hot topic".

I guess the root of my comments here is a reflection on the
fact that no amount of hardware and software protection may
ever be able to protect some users from themselves.

For some users in my office, I wish I could put a
"click-concience" on thier shoulder that would tell them
when NOT to click... for some it's instinctual... for
others, the "cute" and "free" clicks must be irresistable!

BTW, this BETA version appears to be finding and resolving
many more problems than any SpyWare program I've run in the
past... and it's working great with our corporate edition
of Norton AntiVirus. Nice work, MS.

- Andre

 

[Michael Jennings]

What personality types don't get spyware? Cautious types.
Gambling, risk-taking personality types do get spyware.

It seems obvious. Is a study needed to establish this?
Why not? Microsoft Research could fund it. If true, apply
the fact via a personality test during MSAS installation to
get a user profile and to set the program's paranoia degree,
which is defaulted full-bore in the beta - too high for me.