Spyware Warrior

[Scaramouche]

I've been aware of this for a while but I've been too busy to check it out in any detail, but I just got finished with a small test at work today and yep, we are data-mining scumbags. While it's ironic that I posted they were doing this to Aluria just a few weeks and was feeling all hoity-toity, I would prefer our product and company not having this status.

I was wondering since a lot of posters here seem to have some inside information about Ad-Aware's operation (i.e., Mikey, Herbalist) if anyone had any advice on not being listed and/or detected by them. While I'm led to understand that Aluria and Ad-Aware have had some sort of history in the past I'm pretty sure there's no such case here. My questions are:

1 - How do you get this status re-examined? While I can post on their forums about it I'm not confident that it'll get treated with much attention given the normal state of affairs there.

2 - Does anyone know why? I could see it being as a result of being on the Rogue Spyware Remover List, but we've been de-listed for a few weeks now which is probably when this classification took place (e.g., after being de-listed). Is there some gossip/drama you guys aren't telling me about? :)

Anyway, I'm going to try and go through proper channels, whatever they may be, but I was hoping you guys could give me a leg up on the specifics. If not, thanks for reading anyway.
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My comments represent my own opinions and research.

[suzi]

Scaramouche,

Ad-aware flags some other anti-spyware applications also, notable SpyHunter and SpywareNuker, both of which have been de-listed on the Rogue/Suspect Anti-Spyware Programs page.

It's interesting, not in a positive way, that they are targeting other anti-spyware programs but they are not targeting HotBar, which is known adware.

As you can see here:
http://spywarewarrior.com/viewtopic.php?t=5959

this is a hot topic.
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Former Microsoft MVP 2005-2009, Consumer Security
Please do not PM or Email me for personal support. Post in the Forums instead and we will all learn.

[herbalist]

A very similar thread is getting quite hot at:
http://www.freedomlist.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=17746
Lavasoft does claim to re-evaluate their detections, but I can't get to a link to where you do this. Their support forums seem to be down.
Anybody else getting this?

Rick

[eburger68]

Herbalist:

Lavasoft let their registration on the domain for their forums lapse, incredibly enough. Mike Healan noticed it and notified them, but of course they haven't done anything yet. Mike added himself to the waiting list to get the domain to prevent the bad guys from snapping it up.

Eric L. Howes

[Scaramouche]

Suzi -

I also find it interesting. Lavasoft is in a position where they can do a lot of damage to basically any software they don't like. I in no way suggest that they are in fact doing so because truthfully, we were on Eric's list and I can see at least a reason for them doing what they did. What concerns me more is that there doesn't appear to be any transparent process for re-evaluation. While the TAC is useful I'm not sure how our web site violates it, and I wonder if we were included simply because we were on the list. If that's the case, then why target cookies set by our domain instead of the software itself (though that would have been more disastrous we would have had a much more cut and dried approach to not getting listed)?

Alas though, I will middle onwards. The inadvertent comedy of the forums domain registration lapsing came at just the worst time :)
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My comments represent my own opinions and research.