Spyware - Because
its not just big brother any more. Be aware of what is running on
your computer, what it is doing, who put it there, why they put
it there and if they had the right to put it there.
Forget big brother, forget
surveillance cameras, now your every action online could be being
recorded without your explicit permission.
This practice must be brought out into the open, so that you have
a choice before giving out highly personal information. Thats what
this issue is mainly about choice and awareness.
We are not here to stop the collection of consumer data, obviously
it is really important information and helps companies survive in
a competitive environment, but the manner in which it is gathered
is a different matter.
This site is intended to raise awareness of the issue that certain
companies through their software installs are placing "Media
Plugins", "SpyWare", "Backdoor Santas"
or "Trojans" on your computers without your explicit permission
and then potentially forwarding information about software, browsing
& purchasing habits back to their own data collection facilities.
This type of software has become collectively known as SpyWare.
We will also show you how Spyware can be
detected and removed.
Most of these Adbots, or spyware programs DON'T collect specific
information about you, but only report general demographics, and
therefore are NOT stealing your name, credit card, or other personal
information. But these capabilities do exist. Also its good not
to wrongly accuse all Adware in this argument as proper Adware is
a serious revenue model for many software companies that allows
you to get products for free, and used correctly does not pose a
significant privacy threat.
It has been proven that software companies who denied their software
was even able to forward personally identifying information were
not telling the truth. Using combinations of Machine and MAC address
codes you can be tracked.
The information gathered by these companies is potentially being
sold and combined with other databases to build up profiles of individual
web users, we believe this is primarily for direct marketing purposes.
And to quote Gilles Lalonde "...what I do in the privacy of
MY own HOME is MY business and MY business alone, like what you
personally do in the privacy of YOUR own HOME, is YOUR business
and YOUR business alone. Software authors that use spyware do not
care about anyone's privacy. They breach our personal privacy and
spoil our Internet experience ".
Within the net community certain individuals have literally gone
beyond the call of duty in detecting
and raising public awareness of these issues; we would personally
like to thank them for all their hard and inspirational work. Where
possible throughout this site credits are given directly to the
individual with links through to other relevant
resources.
Support Spyware.co.uk and raise awareness about spyware by linking
through to us 'get link code here'
This site is intended to raise awareness of one of the most important
issues affecting private and corporate internet users today. All
Trademarks are the property of their rightful owners.
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