Category: Rants

New York Times Serves Up Malware

Some folks who visited the NYT’s web site over the weekend were greeted with a warning that their system was infected with all sorts of crap. Their ad system had been hijacked by folks posing as a legitimate client (in this case, Vonage) so that the false ads were served up, trying to get people to buy their worthless software.

This isn’t the first time this has happened, sadly. According to the story, FoxNews was hit in the past as well. While I know media companies are desperate for ad revenue, they need to be more diligant about screening this type of thing.

Personally, I wouldn’t lose a night’s sleep if the creators of these scam anti-malware products were to disappear off the face of the earth. In some sort of gruesome way would be fine, too.

Reading some comments on other sites about this, folks are debating various anti-virus products. Avast vs. NOD vs. Avira vs. whatever is a moot point if you don’t keep it regularly updated. I’ve had good luck with Avira, but I know people who swear by NOD and Avast. AVG is fine, but its spyware catching capabilities are pretty minimal in my experience. But for cripe’s sake, update it. So many new computers come with a 90-day trial of some sort of anti-virus product that will stop updating after 90 days (I’m looking at you, Norton). People have been just starting becoming accustomed to clicking “Ignore” on the sales pitch warnings that pop up, so they will have a two-year old computer with an anti-virus program that hasn’t been updated in a long time. Even if it isn’t that great of a program, it’s worthless if it’s out of date.

I’ve also heard folks saying “If Windows were up-to-date and patched, this kind of thing wouldn’t happen.” Sorry, that’s not always the case, either. Hidden PDF files exploiting weaknesses in Acrobat Reader have caused more trouble in the computers I remove malware from than Windows being out of date. (Generally the site’s that have these kinds of embedded PDFs are sites people really shouldn’t be on, but that’s another rant for another time.)

And lastly, you need additional protection on-top of your anti-virus program, as they won’t catch everything. I’ve had really good luck with Malwarebytes’ Anti-Malware and SuperAntispyware. Both have free versions, but each offers a for-pay version that offers real-time protection that is probably superior to whatever protection your anti-virus program offers. I keep copies of both on a USB key. And while some of these really nasty nasties (like one I ran into last week) will detect if you’re trying to run one of those programs and block it, a simple renaming of the executable will usually do the trick.

September 15, 2009

X Could Learn A Lot From Vista, Windows 7

If you don’t know what “X” is, read up here. Simply, X is basically the pile of code that provides a graphical user interface for many Linux and some BSD-based desktop systems. And this guy is absolutely right: The X Windows system could learn some stuff from the big, bad, empire. I’m not a hardcore Linux desktop guy (I use it for servers quite a bit), but my experience with it matches his quite well — it doesn’t take much to break it and bring your system down with it.

August 18, 2009

Router != Switch (or: Just because the plug fits doesn’t mean it’s right)

So the other day I was trying to troubleshoot a network issue at the office (which is always fun, as it’s usually something stupid that requires far too much time to figure out but only 30 seconds to fix). There were a couple computers in the office that couldn’t get onto the Internet. After checking the obvious (that the cable is plugged in properly), I head into the command line to try to ping our firewall, with no luck. I check to see what the IP address for the machine is (and to see if it even had a proper one) and noticed that it was in the 10.x.x.x subnet.

Since our entire network is on the 192.168.1.x subnet, I had no idea why this machine had a 10.x.x.x IP address. Just to make sure the network card was working OK, I manually changed the IP address back to an IP in the office subnet, manually putting in the OpenDNS IP addresses, and got online fine. But the minute I put the computer back to auto-detecting IP settings, it reverted back to 10.x.x.x, and couldn’t get online. I verified that the DHCP server on the network was running properly (it was), so it was either a) a weird thing is Vista that I’ve never come across or b) It was getting its IP address from somewhere else.

I assumed “b)” and installed Wireshark to look for DHCP handshakes and sure enough, there was another DHCP server running in the building somewhere that was overriding my DHCP server (which is basically a dd-wrt router, since that particular office is trying to phase out their Windows Domain/DHCP server).

So the hunt began for the rogue network device. After a bit of searching around the office, I found an old Zyxel wireless router (with a sticker from the long-defunct Unicom) buried under some wires in the corner of an office underneath a desk. It was plugged in where there used to be a switch (no idea what happened to the little five-port switch). Somebody must have figured that “Hey, this thing has network ports on it, it must work to connect all these random cables together.” And it would have probably worked fine, if somebody would’ve turned off the DHCP server on the thing. And it was only affecting a few of the folks in the office as the rest hadn’t renewed their DHCP request yet, so they still had the 192.168.1.x addresses.

But like I said before, pain to figure out, easy to fix.

So for future reference, just because it looks like a switch, and just because the the network cables fit, does not mean you should just randomly plug it in. Especially if it has a big ol’ antenna sticking out of the top if it.

March 23, 2009

I Just Want To Shoot The Frickin’ Meth Addicts

As I mentioned, I’ve had a cold for about a week now. I’m at work, still, as I don’t have much of a choice in the manner, but everybody in our house has gotten the virus at one point over the last few weeks. My wife has it right now, and is horribly plugged up. The only stuff that has ever really helped her (she’s always had sinus and allergy problems) was pseudoephedrine (aka Sudafed). She’s tried all the various over-the-counter stuff over the years, and Sudafed was the only thing that ever really cleared her up.

But thanks to the crackhead meth-addicts (which I know better than to joke about in public), who were using the little red pills to create their drug of choice, a prescription is now required to get the decongestant. What used to cost just a few bucks for a bucketload of pills at Costco now costs quite a bit more. Since I don’t have some fancy zero co-pay health insurance plan (does anybody?) I’d have to pay $25 for my wife to see our doctor to get something written up that’ll cost us about $3 at the pharmacy counter. She doesn’t have a sinus infection (she would know), nor any lung problems, she just has a cold, and needs some snot to come out her head. I called the doc on her behalf because she can’t even talk right now because she’s so plugged up her throat hurts from the snot in the back of her throat that she can’t get rid of. I tried just having the doctor call it in, but our doctor wouldn’t budge (I’m consider switching family doctors, which sucks, as I like the guy).

I just love it when the druggies screw it up for everybody who legitimately need the stuff. Has the meth problem gotten any better in Oregon since this? I don’t have a clue. I doubt it, as most of the ingredients were coming in from Mexico anyway. Why don’t we shut off those channels?

</rant>

December 10, 2008

Kids These Days

Either I’m getting too old or teenagers are getting too stupid. Or probably a bit of both…

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November 11, 2008

How I Plan To Vote Next Time

I’ve already turned in my ballot (or at least filled it out — will drop it off tomorrow), but I’m thinking I’m going to change my voting thought process during the next election. Next time around, I’m going to keep a tally on which ballot measures or political offices put the most crap in my inbox, my mailbox, or on my doorstep, and the group or candidate that badgers me the least will get my vote. I came home on Saturday after being gone most of the day to find my mailbox filled and door hangers all over my porch and front yard. I can only imagine the countless trees that were killed during this election cycle trying to convince me that a certain measure or candidate is good or evil.

I don’t know about you, but whatever the outcome, I’ll just be happy when this election is over.

November 2, 2008

Who Was The Idiot at HP Who Made This Decision?

I have to deal with a bunch of HP and Compaq products at the office from their LaserJets and Deskjet printers to their Proliant servers as well as a few of their laptops and desktops. One of the ways I’ve found information was generally via Google, which has HPs IT Resource Forums and Business Support Forums indexed very well. The forums have always had a solution for the various problems I’ve had, usually there’s been a forum post with a follow up that linked to an appropriate HP/Compaq support article or download page that will give me what I need.

The problem is that HP, in all their infinite wisdom, decided to restructure their support site, effectively killing all those pages that people in the forums linked to. So pages like this, this, this, this, this, this, this and this (among many others, these are just the ones I could find right now) no longer work. The reality is that Google is much better at finding answers in normal language than HP’s own search engine, and clicking through the tons of various options that HP had to find information is a tedious process. There are just tons of dead links all over HP’s site. Whoever the moron was at HP who decided it was a good idea to kill a ton of should-be-permanent links should lose their job.

But for my future reference, since I’ve been dealing with these a lot lately:

I’ll add more bookmarks to this as I find them or remember them.

(Update: Fixed link for 7.80 ISO.)

September 28, 2008

An Open Letter To All Microsoft Office 2007 Users

All you folks with newer computer and IT departments that have more money that ours: Please save your Microsoft Office 2007 files in a format that the rest of the world can open easily. Not everybody can afford (or really feels the need) to spend the money on the upgrade, and can’t open the files you e-mail us. Yes, we can (and I do) install compatibility packs so we can read those*.docx and *.xlsx files, but would it just be easier for you and the clients you send files if you would just save it in the standard Word or Excel format? Or even as a PDF? I work at a real estate office where I get freaked out agents who can’t open up “a critically important document” that somebody has e-mailed them, forcing me to carry around that stupid compatibility pack on a USB key so I can avoid the nearly thirty-megabyte download. I also have vendors send around documentation to their clients that were all in *.docx format, and I know at least 75% of the folks who received the docs couldn’t open it as I just ended up converting it to PDF with CutePDF (after loading the document with the compatibility pack in Office 2003) and it worked fine. I shouldn’t be caused more work to deal with stupid crap like this.

OK, done ranting.

August 28, 2008

Let The County Know You Oppose The Room Tax Increase

I rarely (if at all) get into politics on this blog, as politics and the politicians are just a silly waste of time. That being said, this is something that affects quite a bit of Central Oregon, and really needs to be said.

There is talk of putting a measure on the November ballot to raise the transient room tax in Deschutes County by two percent. Needless to say, lodging industry folks are worried and the Bulletin doesn’t even like the idea (you may need to be a subscriber to get access to those articles).

As many of you know, I do geek and marketing work for a couple vacation rental companies in Sunriver, and obviously anything that potentially is going to turn away tourists directly affects me (even though I’ve been pretty vocal of my loathing of some of our visitors, they do pay my paycheck). But what people around here don’t realize is how much of this area is directly or indirectly affected by tourism dollars coming into this area. Like it or not, we really don’t have another major industry here — tourism is it. So anything that’s going to turn away the tourists affects more than the folks who directly cater to those visitors.

Not only that, but it annoys me that the County has decided to pin their inability to manage their funds onto folks who are visiting the area (who down the road could potentially fall in love with the area, buy a home, and put more money in the County coffers) instead of just fixing the problem.

My boss here — who has been in this industry locally for over 20 years — has written a letter to his homeowners that I’ve edited and he has given me permission to post here. I agree with it 100%. Not because he signs my paycheck, I actually do agree with this. And you really should let your County commissioners and administrators ([email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected]) know that you do, too. Read on for the full letter…

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August 14, 2008

You know, I like watching gymnastics…

…but am I the only one that has a hard time listening to Bart Conner doing the commentary? I find myself muting it whenever he’s on. It’s kind of like Scott Hamilton during the Winter Olympics — I’m sure they’re both really nice people, but something about them bugs the heck out of me.

What’s everybody thought of the coverage so far? I could use a few less Bob Costas moments, but the online coverage has been good.

August 10, 2008