(*ponders*) AngelicKnight brought up an interesting points. There are many other AIM clients out there. I'm not quite sure if the security hole is Windows, AIM network, or AIM client. Might be interesting to try some of the others. If it is, indeed, the client, definitely go for an open source client, now. They have the lowest amount of security risks, because everyone sees them. Google AIM +client. A good one I know of is gAIM.