Not really genius, but sort of. I won’t get into the false virus alert, just say that “modem removal” scripts are not really what I could classify as a virus or threat.

Have some pictures of my fun this morning.

This was the lovely virus warning that welcomed me this morning:

When I clicked to clean, I thought maybe my computer would look less dusty:

I’m clicking whatever Microsoft recommends for me to click on, I’m a sheep:

Now that the evil non-virus was removed, I can see green instead of red, time to go:

If you wonder what you should do with Microsoft Security Essentials, just click. If you need the software and you have a legitimate version of Microsoft Windows, you can download and use Security Essentials for free.

Download: Microsoft Security Essentials

When people or animals inquire about computer issues with me, I’m quick to help and offer all of the phone support necessary. That’s not really enough though, so what if I could offer a more hands-on approach?

I’ve seen places to advertise if I want to start a company, sell goods, sell labor, sell anything. Buy anything. Buy everything. What I want now is to find how to work from my house while still making a good financial living but without the misgivings of commuting over 15 hours every week for employment that is between 52-72 miles from where I live.

Starting a company is nothing new, I’ve started several (though success isn’t measured by opening or closing companies). What would be new for me, and new for others, and just fresh and new, would be if I started a business out of my house that enabled me to help others with computers or nearly anything technical. And not technical too. Sometimes. Maybe. Depending.

The computer business, that’s where I should be able to easily start making some money. Let me try to offer my knowledge about computers and the Internet and provide someone or some group or some company the opportunity to seek my assistance.

Am I smart? Hell yes.

Am I a good worker? Well, that’s debatable amongst some people, but all of my employers have liked me (sans Sears).

What could I offer to you or a company? Knowledge.

I’m willing to fix your computers, network, domain, whatever it is. I’m pretty good, I’m not developing any software for people and I’m not showing someone how to make it rich via the Internet (if I knew that stuff, I would offer it to make me rich and then richer). No, I’m willing to assist with computer support using both the Internet and if you need my help and want me to stop by, just be within my driving commute and I’ll get there for you.

What could I do? Wow, that’s a good question.

Well, I work with a lot of software and hardware products. I help a company that has multiple locations around the world stay connected and communicate. I work in a business environment where I interact with the heads of other IT departments in companies. I work with the co-workers at the office that need assistance in printing or setting up a printer; I consult with companies that have spying or Trojan issues; I’ve done work with computer-users that don’t give regular names but a thank you from haxoredlife is always welcome still.

I know what the deep web is, TOR, onion, and other things people will pretend to know about but really have very little understanding.

Sometimes I use Wikipedia, sometimes I contribute to Wikipedia but only in writing, never in financial contributions.

I know how social networks operate, how to manipulate them, and how to abuse them in good or bad ways.

There’s not a lot that I haven’t been reading or trying or forgetting about in the world of computers, electronics, and general technology.

I know why facebook has spam and why people will never remove their facebook information no matter how much they want to.

I have recovered pictures from “crashed” hard disk drives that people have thanked me profusely for, saving an image that represents one fraction of a second of time in someone’e world could mean a lot more than one might think.

So what will I do? I’m probably going to find someone that has people networking skills and will start letting the peeps in my geographic location know that I’m going to be available.

And if someone compares me to the entire Best Buy Geek Squad, I will guarantee them that I’m much smarter and more capable and maybe, just maybe, I might be less expensive too… but the price doesn’t matter, you won’t worry about pricing, the quality will always exceed the monetary loss.

Now if I could only think of a good company name for Dave’s computer and other stuff fixing guy thing.

There won’t be a full history on downloads and how and why, nor will I really mention where the following data came from and how it can or can’t be substantiated. Trust that the data was downloaded and that my newsgroup subscription is rarely not used or abused.

If you need me to download something for you, just let me know, I seem to be pretty good at it.

For those of you just trying to figure that out, I’ve downloaded almost 2 terabytes of data.

There are many people that download more than that and there are many people have uploaded all of that data enabling me to download it. Whether you have downloaded more or less than I have, you should still admit that downloading almost 2 terabytes of data is something that requires some follow through.

What can you put 2 terabytes of data upon and what would require something like that?

For whatever reason, I’ll keep my downloading rolling along and will continue to amass more data than ever necessary.

15,424,357,214,648 ………. bits
1,928,044,651,831 ………. bytes
1,882,856,105.3037109375 kilobytes
1,838,726.6653356552 megabytes
1,795.6315091168 gigabytes
1.7535463956 terabytes
0.0017124476 petabytes
0.0000016723 exabytes
0.0000000016 zettabytes

Crazy times… I’m upgrading the Internet connection at work from bonded T1 to Ethernet, wait until I have a 10MB connection, I’ll pass that 2 TB in no time.

I don’t know how quick most stories I read about tech-related items are actually written in. I know that sometimes I need to read a story a couple times because of the disbelief, and sometimes I just read a story because one or two lines will grab my attention.

I’m giving you a small list of the articles I’ve read today, but only gave linking text from part of the article, and it’s probably not the most attention-grabbing words, but since the lines came from the web pages than the writers are taking full responsibility in what they write.

RIM said most of the problem devices were still in warehouses or stores and hadn’t reached customers.

British scientist Stephen Hawking has branded heaven a “fairy story”

fat plays an important role in peoples’ susceptibility to metabolic diseases like obesity, heart disease and diabetes, the regulating gene could be target for drugs

On the reason why it took over two months after the earthquake to reveal the information

Donald Trump bowed out of the 2012 contest in true Trump fashion, saying that while he would not be a candidate this year, if he had run, he would have been able to win

It’s been almost two months since the world took a collective dump on Rebecca Black

partly replacing cashiers and the use of banknotes at its 7,000 fast-food restaurants

Fox announced the cancellation Monday and will be replacing the show on the network’s regular schedule with reruns

I won’t continue giving just a small snippet from the articles, you should be reading your own stuff and the idea that these links are news related sort of makes them useless by the time I post this article, but the idea is still entertaining enough that I wrote about it.

* I’m not sure if I really enjoy reading anymore, as most of the reading I do these days is for helping school-grade kids or just trying to keep up with my industry. I do read books that aren’t technical, but not as often as I read tech books.

I tried to remove the almost useless Symantec Endpoint software because…. well, it’s almost useless. I’ve been using Symantec products at one time or another since Trend Micro exploded and rendered a Windows 2000 Server worthless and McAfee installed with virus definitions version 0.0.0 on December 31, 1969.

After the alleged removal of Symantec Endpoint and all of its mess failed I was left with the annoyances left from a sloppy install/uninstall. As an example, anytime I would activate the menu often seen when a right-click occurs I would receive Symantec’s attempting to install error.

I started with a Google search to find ways to fix the Symantec annoying remnants. What I found was that many people posted their frustrations and difficulties with Symantec’s software uninstallation, but very few people had the answer. I usually just read someone else’s blog posts or forum questions/answers information on how to get over, under, and around a problem. Symantec proved the help needed is not always a Google search away.

Most of the links I found on Google were for people having the same problem I was having, but the answers that were accompanying the people seeking advice were all lousy. All of the answers. ALL OF THEM!

I went through the Symantec process, which I refuse to give a link to (I would sooner link to a hacker site that promises to take away all of your birthdays and special occasions). It is terrible that Symantec refers its customers to a Microsoft registry cleaning tool, which Microsoft removed from its site a long time ago, as the FINAL way for offering help. Shame on your Symantec. Shame.

Anyway, Symantec’s first suggestion for problems is to re-install the software, then try to remove it. Though I didn’t have the software originally, I was able to find my copy of it. I re-installed it as per instructions, then when trying to un-install it (again)….

Since that failed and Symantec poorly keeps their brands mixed (Norton and Symantec) I followed the next mixed direction, recommending I download and run the Norton software removal tool. Since it wasn’t the easiest thing for me to find and I feel bad for anyone using the Symantec (or Norton) products that might want to escape their treacherous hold, I have included a link to the Norton crap removal tool at the end of this article.

I started the Norton removal tool and though I did not see the name/version of the software I was trying to remove (Symantec Endpoint), I continued trying to run the software recommended to me by the company.

FAIL!

I decided that I would escalate my issue and made a phone call. Which was pointless. I was only on the phone for a little time before my specialized account assistant (who helps with the Enterprise accounts) who informed me that the clean wipe tool would be the only solution Symantec has for me, except for suggesting a new Windows installation…. not a chance.

So I contacted support, waited the “amount of time” needed, then was given access to the Symantec Clean Wipe tool. The best part about this tool is that it doesn’t make the computer worse off like the actual software its attempting to remove. Also, I like any tool that will work on removing remnants.

Now this next part, I just started clicking Yes because of the excellent options presented.

Do you want CleanWipe to uninstall Symantec Endpoint Protection? This will force a restart with CleanWipe automatically resuming processing. YES

If Virus Defs remain after uninstalling Symantec products do you want to uninstall the Virus Defs? (Recommended) YES

Do you want to uninstall SymEvent? (Recommended) YES

Do you want to uninstall SymEvent? (Recommended) YES

If LiveUpdate remains after uninstalling Symantec products do you want to uninstall LiveUpdate? (Recommended) YES

Do you wnt to uninstall Windows related files? (Recommended) YES

Do you want to do a detailed MSI Product Code registry search? It can take up to 30 minutes. (Not Recommended) YES

After CleanWipe completes, do you want to restart the computer? (Strongly Recommended) NO

Now the reason for the NO response above is that I didn’t know when the software program was going to be finished with my computer and I have other things that I was working on, so I decided instead when I would restart the computer (and since it prompted me nicely when it was ready and I happened to be ready at the time I was asked, I could have let the software restart for me).

After the computer restarted the CleanWipe software continued to run and eventually “cleaned” the registry and maybe even other areas that it had previously violated the drive.

It’s been 3 minutes since I removed the Symantec and its been a lovely 3 minutes, so go ahead and uninstall and remove that Symantec crap, BUT FIRST have some alternative antivirus software, just in case you can’t keep your computer free from bad stuff without help.

I’m running Microsoft Security Essentials. It’s an acceptable software program and hasn’t let anything get by in the virus/malware world, yet. Though I would rather recommend something that costs a lot of money, this is the logical choice for now.

Norton Removal software
Symantec Clean Wipe software
Microsoft Security Essentials software
MalwareBytes software (also recommended)

buy Symantec if you still feel compelled!

I brought the company where I work into the 21st century of server computer hardware and software (though I still have some older systems still being maintained). Some of the more recent changes at work:

• upgrade Exchange 2003 to Exchange 2010
• upgrade SharePoint 200x to WSS or SharePoint 2007
• install BlackBerry Enterprise Server 5.0.x
• enable terminal server accounting access from USA operations to worldwide locations

There are more changes on the way too, but there is a little that I need to work on before taking on another major project.

I had a lot of work in order to make those upgrades/changes listed above, so don’t think that it was all easy click-click-click work. I’ve gone through enough work making things work that I can pretty confidently tell my friends I’m able to assist them in a non-perfect environment for updating or upgrading or (more preferred) installing clean and fresh!

I’ll hopefully get into the busy stuff soon, but there’s a little time for play now and again.

Since I don’t associate this amazingly great and perfect blog with the other blogs and websites that I have, I can’t show you what I have come up with, but I can tell you that it’s another website, this one will be following the act of paying off bills and avoiding the eventual collapse that many Americans are going through financially.

Maybe I will give the URL at some point, but for now, I would rather not share that closely with those that I know or that might know me. I’m not proud of the position that I’m in financially right now, but I will still do my best to get out of it without having to fail and give up.

At some point I will be sharing with readers of this site the actual numbers of sites and money those sites generate (or cost), but that’s not what this site is currently about.

Thanks for the understanding… I think that this will be the center of the empire that I have started building.

The problem I always seem to run into is time.

It would be illogical to some, but the more work that I get and the more ideas that I have, the less time that I have (or at least that’s the way it feels). I’ve even stopped doing lots of things I use to do with my extra available time.

Though many of you don’t know, I use to shoot pool in a pool league. I actually was shooting on three different pool teams on three consecutive weeknights. It was hard. I gained many friends, had lots of opportunities to drink (and learn pool), spent lots of money on alcohol, gained some skills in pool, and had some great times.

My friends are mostly still playing pool. Me? Only at home (nights during the week and anytime on weekends). I still use pool, but before it was for fun and now it’s become more of a self-challenge while developing into a stress reliever in some ways.  Enough about that though, lets talk ideas!

I’m a friggin’ crazy nut. That’s the best way for me to state it. I can come up with a new business idea just by surfing the web for a little time or by listening to people in conversations. What do I do with this creative power?  Nothing.

Well…. nothing is starting to change. Nothing will become something and I will learn to make a residual income based on hard work that I will start and continue.

Because, without money you have no money.

Where do I start on this very optimistic move on my part? It’s time to register domains @ GoDaddy (click the link and register a domain and I’ll make a buck!). I’ll start my registration and will find a way to keep you up on what I’m doing with the domains.

It’s time for me to step it up…. watch out for me!

I was asked to check out the link and report if it was safe or not. I checked it out and within 30 seconds noticed my computer playing the block-the-virus game. Of course I didn’t want to stop at just that, so I decided to check it out further.

The worm being spread via different websites is referred to as W32.Koobface.D over on Symantec’s website. Let me just show you some things that might help you to identify what was wrong with this fake Facebook page so that the scammers or spammers can do a better job in the future.

First the Facebook warning page. It’s nice that Facebook has created a page that lets you know when Facebook is doing the redirect off of its site. This warning page only lets you know that you are leaving Facebook, but doesn’t offer any more protection than that. I’m not sure that its Facebook’s job to protect users more than this, but maybe it should be.

The image below has two red outlines on it. The first is on the URL. The problem with the URL is that it clearly does not say “Facebook” or any other variant with that word. This could easily have read “http://FACEBOOK.somedomain.com” and been a little more likely to fool someone. I did notice the IP address changes among several different addresses. ARIN states that the IP address shown belongs to an address on Comcast. There are several computers on different ISPs that seem to be either infected and allowing others to be infected or there are a group of people trying hard to start the spread of this worm.

The second red outline is around the Internet Explorer warning, letting you know that some program is trying to download onto your computer without your permission. Naughty, naughty!

Now even though I have Flash installed, the fake Facebook page says that it needs to be installed so that I can view the video. Of course, clicking on the link gives me an opportunity to download something, just not something i want. In fact, the entire webpage has code on it that allows a mouse click anywhere to initiate an attempt at trying to download bad stuff onto the future victim’s computer.

In the lower right of the webpage, I noticed that they had copied the look of the bottom bar on Facebook. The problem is that they they used a poor image that shows decreased quality over the regular images on Facebook’s bottom bar. Oh ya, and that chat is enabled also tells me something is off because I’ve disabled chat on my Facebook account. I won’t complain about the position being off a little, that’s in the next paragraph.

Now that I’ve decided to point this last piece out it’s more like complaining. There is text on the bottom of the page which there is not on Facebook. The text in this case is showing a date and time of some sort, though it definitely isn’t today (“19.08.2009 21:00 frame counter”). Perhaps this is so that the phisherman can keep track of something and maybe their web code is echoing something it shouldn’t.

The Symantec AntiVirus Detection Results window is nice, it gives me a sense of confidence that my computer will be protected even with potentially evil stuff trying to infect my poor little PC.

Whenever I would click anywhere on the webpage the file would try to install on my computer. Of course I needed to be smart enough to choose CANCEL instead of RUN or SAVE.

I found it more interesting that the webpage is doing tracking with an external tracking website. I would get into the specifics, but its really not necessary… if you have protected yourself from this than you are good to surf on. If you have infected your computer and somehow came to this website for help, let me know and I’ll tell you how to get rid of the bad stuff.

I wonder if extremetracking.com knows what they are tracking…