The danger of pop-up advertisements
Ok, so I've been reading this article
http://www.mnin.org/write/2005_trimode.html
Its heavy going, so I'm not going to ask you to grok the entire thing. I'll distill it down to some salient points for the purposes of this commentary:
“So, the popper() function executes as soon as the page loads. If the user closes the browser then popp() and xit() execute. In other words, all 3 functions execute, no matter what the user does.“
“The user thought if she closed the browser immediately, then it would reduce the amount of damage. In fact she just acted as a catalyst for the infection. Upon closing the browser window, she executed xit():“
“Second, similar to the lose-lose situation presented earlier, the function is called no matter if the browser is shut down or if it encounters an error “
I mentioned similar nasty tricks briefly in my article published back in December:
http://www.microsoft.com/windows/IE/community/columns/adware.mspx
”Sometimes adware pop-ups are deliberately deceptive. I have seen examples where the "no" or "cancel" buttons are actually "yes" or "install" buttons. I have also heard of pop-up windows with fake Close buttons that when clicked trigger malware installations, much to the shock of their victims.”
With hindsight, I wish I had placed far more emphasis on such tricks in that article.
So, how do we protect ourselves? What are the only safe ways to close pop up advertisements?
Use the Ctrl, Alt, Del key combination to start Task Manager. Then use Task Manager to close all iexplore.exe processes.
Alternatively, shut down all *other* programme properly, then turn your computer's power off without touching any browser windows - sometimes spyware will block access to Task Manager :o(