See you later, anti gator

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IN RESPONSE TO a libel lawsuit, an antispyware company has settled with Gator and pulled Web pages critical of the company, its practices and its software. And other spyware foes are getting the message.
“There is this feeling out there that they won the lawsuit, and people are starting to get scared,” said one employee of a spyware-removal company, who asked not to be named. “We haven’t been sued, but we’ve heard that other companies are being sued for saying this and that, so we’ve changed our language” on the company Web site.
Gator often distributes its application by bundling it with popular free software like Kazaa and other peer-to-peer programs. When downloaded, Gator’s application serves pop-up and pop-under ads to people while they’re surfing the Web or when they visit specific sites. Ads can be keyed to sites so that a pitch for low mortgage rates, say, can appear when a surfer visits a rival financial company’s site.

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Continued over here

Hmmm very intersting indeed.
Nice link enjoyed the information feed immensly.

(Gator often distributes its application by bundling it with popular free software like Kazaa and other peer-to-peer programs. When downloaded, Gator’s application serves pop-up and pop-under ads to people while they’re surfing the Web or when they visit specific sites. Ads can be keyed to sites so that a pitch for low mortgage rates, say, can appear when a surfer visits a rival financial company’s site.)

Me likes that idea, i think that by doing something along these lines i might be able to get at least one person to visit my site........

Cheers

I think we have two issues here?

1. If you download freeware and it has scumware attached to it, you might actually be violating the EULA if you remove it. There is some software called "The Silencer", that spoofs your IP addy to 127.0.0.1, and effectively gags the spyware................not that I would condone any breach of the EULA :p

2. If you intercept someone's website, you are actually "defacing" it? I really cannnot see the difference between doing that and sticking a rival poster over someone else's roadside hoarding? I would expect to see the principals (those employing the adware company) getting sued for loss of profits, consequential damages and the rest.

I think that Gator might be shooting themselves in the foot, by drawing attention to themselves :D

Cheers

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1. If you download freeware and it has scumware attached to it, you might actually be violating the EULA if you remove it. There is some software called "The Silencer", that spoofs your IP addy to 127.0.0.1, and effectively gags the spyware................not that I would condone any breach of the EULA

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are you falling for this legal bullshit? if someone says up-front their produce is free, then free it should be. by hiding a stipulation some where in a eula that you must view the ads, then its not really free is it. if they do not state, up front in easy to read language that their product contains ad-ware or is in fact itself ad-ware then it IS a trojan and therefore illegal. i dont care what congressmen or senator their paying off. and the sooner we all KNOW this to be true then the sooner we can get rid of it.

if they get you to believe this then their is no hope. if enough believe it then it becomes so. stop spreading the word of the defilers.

my feeling is, if its on MY harddrive, its mine to do with as i please. there is not a single peice of software on my hard drive that is as it is out of the gate, i remove and add whatever I want, wherever I want, whenever I want, and if anyone has a problem with it, good luck stopping me. If I think part of your software is putting my data or network at risk, its gone, and if anyone has a problem with that, I'd be happy to buy my software from someone who doesn't. Ad-ware is dangerous, not just annoying, coding techniques used to create pop-ups, pop-under, and other means of arbitrary window management have security holes that can and have been exploited by attackers and rogue programs to gain unauthorized access to host systems, and I for one will not comprimise my security so you can get a few cents everytime someone wants a lower mortgage rate.

I hate software companys like that. You install something and it installs a bunch of other crap along with it. I mean the average Joe is not going to sit there and read the EULA and they are pretty sneaky with the things they are installing. I agree that I don't think that it is free if you are forced to look at ads from a third party application that basically installed itself along with what you were installing. I wonder how much money they actually make off of their pop up ads. Most people I know just get pissed off with them. F**k Gator - Spyware, Adware whatever. It is still Sh*t.

I hate ad-crap progs too.

1) First way is block all progs that u dont want acces to i-net and terminate them.
2) Find good alternativ.
3) Change OS.
4) Make own progs.

Thay won for a while.
Not evry one have time and can do that. Our hope left to them who want and can do that for free for other. New alternativ like kazaa lite++ is popup free and DC++. It become be more ad free alternativ and i hope that it will be so long time. We getting too much reklam that we dont need and stopping care about. The end is that no one will use ad-crap progs soon and it should be more free, just donate progs. I hope so.

What about acceptable use policies in state and federal institutions. Just by browsing to certain sites and Gator getting dropped on a system without any user intervention is a violation of most AUPs. And, Gator is lying whey they say that people know they are downloading and installing their software. I've seen their software install with no user intervention, no OK button, nothing.

i agree, if its intalled on my harddrive without my prior consent, and i discover it, i should be able to remove it if i want to, after all most spyware is installed without us knowing about it therefore, if i dont want it, i should be able to remove it.
spyware sucks by the way, just thought id add that.

Hi Tedob1,

I think that you misinterpreted my sentiments there :( you did not notice the little smilie after my comment?

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are you falling for this legal bullshit? if someone says up-front their produce is free, then free it should be. by hiding a stipulation some where in a eula that you must view the ads, then its not really free is it. if they do not state, up front in easy to read language that their product contains ad-ware or is in fact itself ad-ware then it IS a trojan and therefore illegal. i dont care what congressmen or senator their paying off. and the sooner we all KNOW this to be true then the sooner we can get rid of it.

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The product I mentioned is very careful, it just sends erroneous info to the spyware, so it doesnt work. You have therefore done nothing wrong, as you are entitled to run whatever software you like (within other laws governing treason, porngraphy and so on)

My basic point is that the supposed "freeware" never actually says that it is free? there are always very clear statements that you have to take a law degree, read the EULA and so on? :mad: If you "castrate the spy/adware as I always do, then you might be in violation of the EULA.................my defence is that I know absolutely nothing about spyware, did not know it was there, so how could I have damaged it...........it must have been defective on arrival :D

If it simply cannot gather information and function in my environment, then that is their problem not mine. I am real sure they would compensate me if their stuff screwed up my computer.

I still say that my second comment on messing with other people's websites in order to gain unfair advantage is valid?


Cheers

Okay I will follow.

"In Recent reports, Gator won the recent suit...They will no longer be called 'spy-ware'. Companies will now call the product by its rightful name: 'Secretely Installed Program That Exploits Windows Messanger Holes And Sends Users Annoying Pop-up Pro version 3.5.'"

sorry nihil i really didn't see the smiley. when i see that kind of talk i just see red! my appolagies!

i think its really screwed up that the point the courts are arguing is if gator has the right to pop-up ads on other biz's pages:

( http://news.com.com/2100-1024-102279...t=dtx&tag=ntop )

what about my right to choose what software goes on my computer? if they were acting of and for the people there wouldn't be anything to debate

and ok so gato is not "spy-ware". it still sucks. No where visable on their vectors discription of its product is their ad-ware discribed. and even in the eula nothing indicates
how browsing the internet will become a major frustration, to the average user, because of it.



i think that the people in politics had better start getting on OUR side if they want to keep their jobs...payoffs stop coming when your no longer in office.

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Originally posted here by nihil
I would expect to see the principals (those employing the adware company) getting sued for loss of profits, consequential damages and the rest.

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If memory serves, they were sued, and won...the courts decided that they were within their rights to deface web pages/use pop-ups/unders like they do. I'll look for references if requested...

what annoys me the most about Gator and others (at least you're warned about Gator and WeatherCast if you actually read the EULA) is that I've removed the software and had them left behind...go to the Gator removal tool to find the crudware that Gator is attached to, and there is none...yet Gator is still there and functioning. And, just this past weekend I removed about 25 reg hooks from several spyware progs that I supposedly removed months ago.

Hi trigeek,

thanks for your comments and yes (if it is not too much trouble) I would like a link or two ....being over here I do not really know where to look, even though I DO know how to use a search engine :) It is of great interest to me, as we are all going to have to come together in international law, to make the internet safe?

I think I will sue gator under European Law................I think they would settle, and I could take all AO members for a glorious drink up in the Bahamas?


Sooner or later our brane dead politicians (I have a "brain" personally) are going to realise that the "fat brown envelope" days are over?..............and I do not mean that the stationery has changed :cool:

Cheers

A prime example of this gatorware is DivX (the video player) if you go to DivX.com and download their "free" player you are forever plagued with pop-ups. However, you do consent to letting it be installed on your comp. The bad thing is, it is damn near impossible to get rid of. Ugghhh...anyway I too wonder how much money these companies make off of allowing Gator with their freeware.



Adiz

Spyware, adaware, etc is anathma. I don't give a S**t what the courts say on this subject. This crap uses your bandwidth, i have seen a friends pc reduced to a snails pace because of this stuff and he only had two pieces of adaware on his system, weatherbug and gator.

Both are right bastards to remove manualy. I think it should be ilegal to make any piece of software that has not got an uninstaller or that doesn't support uninstall within the opperating system.

Just mt opinion.