Jewish World Review August 18, 2004 /1 Elul, 5764


Browser was hijacked — HELP!; keeping prying eyes away stuff kept on Windows desktop; more

By James Coates

http://www.NewsAndOpinion.com | (KRT) Q. My Web browser has been hijacked so that when I open it the page that comes up is not my desired home page. Everything I do to restore my home page doesn't work once I close and restart the browser. I downloaded a program called "SpyHunter" off the Internet; it claimed to find and delete hijackers, but has failed to live up to its claims.

Can you help me out with getting rid of this pesky thing?

Doug Forbis@yahoo.com

A. It's a good thing I'm not in charge of law enforcement around here. I would find every browser hijack creator, toss each and every one into a jail cell and then toss away the key. My dander dusts up big time because browser hijacking not only ranks among the nastiest of spyware attacks, but also can be the most difficult of all to correct. Sometimes fixing them is close to impossible without drastic measures like an operating system reinstallation.

Typically a victim will get a pop-up ad or maybe an e-mail with a link that leads to a Web site that asks the target to approve a change to something or accept free downloaded software. That click of approval allows the troublemaker to change the browser home page and then set up booby traps to make fixing it quite difficult. This works by secreting executable programs all over the hard drive and then making multiple changes in the Windows registry to run the booby traps when the browser is started.

That's why you cannot thwart a hijack by going to Tools, Internet Options and click to change the home page under the General tab.

The most virulent hijacks use a complex system of so-called host files to reach out to the Web and restore hijack settings even if all the other traps are found and killed.

Happily--unless getting forced to spend money to fix things makes you unhappy--many of the larger spyware prevention programs now include search-and-destroy routines for most hijack schemes. A handy place to find links to the makers of these programs such as AdAware, SpyBot and such is at the Spywareinfo Web site: www.spywareinfo.com/articles/hijacked.

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I point you there, Mr. F., because this site, run by computer enthusiasts who I rank among the good guys, also contains advanced help for those blighted souls who get hijacked by the most virulent perpetrators. I hope it turns out that you're not among them.

Q. I have a small problem that I am hoping you will be able to help solve. I need a new laptop. I have a Compaq Presario now. It is too heavy and the battery does not last very long. I am leaning toward a 4-6-pound range, at least two hours of battery life and wireless. Is there such a machine out there?

Walter Loflink@bellsouth.net

A. You asked for opinion and that's all I can offer shy of undertaking a formal review of the laptops on the market, a project I haven't undertaken recently. So may I just suggest that you go to Dell, Mr. L.? That, you'll note, is the Web-based computer company's somewhat sophomoric recent advertising slogan at Dell.com.

Check out the company's Latitude line of machines sold to businesses rather than the Inspiron models geared toward consumers.

The best advice I can offer to ordinary folks shopping for laptops with low weight as the primary consideration is, no matter which company you are shopping at, move beyond the offerings for home use and look at laptops designed for sales to larger businesses.

The latest Latitude 400 is 1 inch thick and weighs 3.7 pounds with the Intel Pentium mobile wireless processor. This product for medium-size businesses will make your mobile computing equipment lighter and make your wallet lighter with a $2,368 base price.

The price includes an extra 6-cell battery, and Dell's usually stand out for battery life. With a 12.1-inch screen, this certainly qualifies as a small machine. As a long-time user of an earlier mini Latitude from Dell, I can tell you there will be a learning curve before you are comfortable with the correspondingly small keyboard.

You will find competitive machines at the other major consumer companies like Gateway and Hewlett-Packard. Again, the trick is to ignore the offerings for home use and even for small-business use, and look for machines designed for medium and large enterprises.

Let me add that IBM, which pretty much has abandoned consumer-oriented marketing, now offers an ultralight ThinkPad model X40. With a starting price of $1,800, these machines scrimp on things like hard-drive size and CD/DVD drives to save weight. The X40 comes with a docking base that includes DVD/CD drives and ports for various peripherals.

As a final thought, remember that if you go primarily for weight, you'll lose many of the benefits that come with heavier laptops. These include built-in DVD burners, video cards, large hard drives, memory-card readers and other features that mean little to businesses but quite a lot to those of us who work for them.

Q. My problem might be described as a desire to be sneaky, or maybe you can just say that I am a privacy advocate, but either way I need a way to keep prying eyes away from stuff I like to keep on my Windows desktop.

I don't want casual visitors to see things like files I have downloaded from the Web onto the desktop and files that I moved there while working on them.

Mike Davis @earthlink.net

A. I too don't like to have my computer's desktop broadcast my favorite programs, my recent downloads and other personal matters. Besides, those icons also spoil the slick screensavers that I make out of my digital photos.

So here is my solution, Mr. D.:

In Windows XP a command to hide the desktop display is itself well-hidden under the commands for arranging icons. I guess Microsoft considers making something disappear a way of arranging it. So right-click on the desktop and open the Arrange Icons tool and scroll down to the Hide Desktop Icons tool. When activated all icons vanish from the desktop until you backtrack and pick Show Desktop Icons.

Now you've got a new problem, Mr. D. How are you going to find that stuff once so visibly plastered on the monitor screen when you need it? You'll find that using the hide/show commands are a big bother when you are in a hurry. So my solution is to create a shortcut for the desktop and then place it in the Quick Launch bar in the lower left of the screen. Clicking on that icon opens a regular folder with the desktop contents in it.

To make a desktop shortcut, right-click on Start and use the Windows Explorer to move to the C: drive, and then Documents and Settings, and then to your own account, where you will find the desktop icon. Give it a right-click and a shortcut icon will be created on your desktop.

Now right-click on the taskbar and select Toolbars and then Quick Launch to let you drag shortcuts for favorite programs onto the taskbar. Finally, drag the ordinary icon for the desktop onto the taskbar, where it will appear as a tiny icon. Now delete the big icon and use the Arrange Icons to arrange for the desktop to disappear.

In the future, you can quickly get stuff moved onto the desktop by clicking on the icon in the Quick Launch area.

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James Coates is a columnist for the Chicago Tribune. Let us know what you think of this column by clicking here.

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