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MS Antispyware Beta


Question

Despite the massive number of new people who are flocking to the Beta of Microsoft's anti-spyware program.... I have some concerns. It seems that those concerns are justified. Before you fall all over yourself to proclaim the new MS(Microsoft) Anti-Spyware Beta as the holy grail of PC protection....you might want to give this a read.

http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1895,1836008,00.asp

This is a very informative article that covers exactly why the MS Anti-Spyware program is no longer one that you or I can trust. It even goes into some good detail as to exactly why we can no longer trust what was once a great product.

I have tested the MS Anti-Spyware Beta, and honestly, it's left me feeling more frustrated at the fall of a once great product, than anything else. The program blatantly disregards any customized user settings. Even if you tell it not to, it still shows pop-ups every single time that it allows something. That's right, every single time that it allows something to happen, a nice, informative, and annoying pop-up comes up to let you know what a good job the program is doing in allowing things to happen. I can possibly understand a pop-up, if user requested, when the program blocks something.....but a pop-up EVERY time that it allows something? That's completely ridiculous. It's also a feature that will cause many games that run in full screen to crash. For some reason, it also ignores user settings to not run a spyware scan of your files and folders whenever it suits the program's whim to do so. The so-called "Spynet" that you can subscribe to, supposedly for faster updates to newly found products.....is one that I don't trust as far as I could pick up and throw Bill Gates limo. Why? Because I do not trust the findings of untrained individuals, with no professional experience, to decide what is spyware and what is not.

Sadly it seems that the war with spyware, unlike the war against computer viruses, is a war that is being lost. Even the best rated commercial anti-spyware program will only detect about 50-60% of the spyware out there. Sadly, a lot of those programs are unable to even remove some of the spyware that they detect. Freeware alternatives aren't much help either. Even with Spybot Search and Destroy, Ad-Aware SE Personal, and Spyware Blaster combined, you still miss a lot, and I mean A LOT of spyware that is out there. Even with the latest definition files for each of those programs, you're still not fairing too well at finding, removing, or blocking spyware.

Is there a solution? It's hard to say. Part of the problem all comes down to the motive of any business......to make money. Why be in business if you aren't trying to earn a profit? Sadly, some companies will pursue profit by any means necessary. Does this include intentionally changing their spyware definition files to allow this product or that.....so the company can get a check from an advertising firm? It's scary to think of, but given the proof documented in the above link, it doesn't seem that far fetched.

I also feel that part of the problem has to do with how spyware and/or adware is classified. They are classified as an entirely different animal from a computer virus. You won't find Norton, McAfee, or any of the other anti-virus giants, intentionally allowing viruses onto your PC. Why? Because computer viruses, regardless of their intended function, are ALL blatantly harmful in one way or another. Adware is just a program for putting advertising in front of potential customers. Spyware is just a program that gathers "research" information on a user to better be able to create new programs tailored to their needs....right?

So then, what is the problem? Those don't sound too harmful. WRONG. Not only can spyware or adware cause all sorts of problems, but worse still they can lead to serious crimes such as identity theft. There is simply no justification whatsoever, for any company to resort to spying on people, and blatantly invading their privacy. Likewise, there is no justification for harassing people with unwanted advertising. The old line that a company can only allow you to try or use their product if you accept advertisements from their sponsors.....is completely and total bull. There are so many potentially areas that a company or individual can gain profit from a product....that there simply is no need whatsoever for harassing people with advertising or stealing their private information.

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https://www.neowin.net/forum/topic/374063-ms-antispyware-beta/
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it's Microsoft, not M$, or MS, or Microshaft, or Micro****..

and that is totally bias.. hes just attacking microsoft

but a pop-up EVERY time that it allows something?

... ive been running Microsoft anti-spyware beta for a couple of months now.. since it first launched. and it only comes up ONCE (per program) and never comes up again... and you can disable that.

:no: this is bogus.. not worth reading

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I'm more critical of Microsoft than I am of any other tech company, as they have an enormous advantage in developing Windows-based software. That said, I've been using their anti-spyware app since it's first public beta, and I think it's fantastic. I haven't looked into it's accuracy of detecting spyware, but from a UI standpoint, it's top-notch. It's very informative, and if anything, I think it makes the user more knowledgable in computer use.

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It hasn't ignored my settings. I have it set to not run unless I run it. I don't need it nor desire it to run in the background. It hasn't gone against my wishes at all. As for detection success, it found stuff ad-aware found and more.

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MS is even how Microsoft calls itself lol  what do you think the MS in MSDN means?

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when you spell it in a title, or in a paragraph.. you used Microsoft. you don't need to use abbreviations while writting on a forum... it literally takes, no more then 2 second for me to type "microsoft" why do you guys keep typing M$...

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yea about the "allowed alerts..."

post-14806-1127088116_thumb.jpg

but I guess that setting will be ignored so Microsoft can prove something to me, right?

This has to be a joke...

and just so you know, for the evil Micro$oft not to ignore your settings, you have to outsmart them by clicking "save" at the bottom.

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Tbh, starting a debate with "M$" removes about half of the respect people will have for your point.

There's only one real solution to cleaning spyware/adware, a clean install and a bit of an education, spyware's always gonna be a problem for one simple fact, it's not completely illegal, write a virus, and you know it's illegal, write some of the stuff GAIN comes up with and you're in the money.

Yes, antispyware programs aren't there yet, but I'm a big believer that some of the free programs do a damn good job, (but then I'm biased cos I think Symantec's Let's-Take-Norton-And-Bolt-On-A-Few-Spyware-Definitions-And Bump-Up-The-Price is a bit of a joke), plus I've seen higher detection rates on free software than on most commercial stuff.

As for Spynet, it's edited by a lot of people who know what they're doing, no company in their right mind would just let the world's opinion of software be the only deciding factor.

Antispyware does a good job, always has, even when it was Giant, for me, the popup arguements a mute point, installed it, once it's settled it's fine, as for popping up during a game, what software are you running in the background.

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my only problem with Antispyware is that it does not seem be to anywhere close to the implementation that Windows Firewall has. I think that it needs to become less bloated and more like Windows Firewall where it is completely integrated and not a separate program (possible Service Pack 3?). Also, it mentions that it tells you to ignore Claria software, but you can change that to remove it, and at least it still detects it. For me, it's the best one out there, always has been even before MS bought it.

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I think that it needs to become less bloated and more like Windows Firewall where it is completely integrated and not a separate program (possible Service Pack 3?).

586546154[/snapback]

The moment Microsoft does that, at least a dozen of lawsuit from Anti-Spyware software companies all over the world will be filed.

Also, while Microsoft didn't completely develop this software, the credit still should go to Microsoft for making it publicly available and easier to use. Afterall, we thank Google for Picasa.

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You also have to remember that GIANT AntiSpyware was written in Visual Basic. If Microsoft wants to do anything as far as OS integration, I'm sure they will integrate it in Vista, and hopefully rewrite it in C++, if not, C#/VB.Net.

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I love the way people complain about bugs in betas.

Personally, I think Microsoft AntiSpyware does a decent job. I don't have it running in the systray because I believe it to be a resource hog (I'm very picky with what loads up in my systray). But if ever a customer has a spyware/adware problem then on it goes.

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My apologies if my opions of the Microsoft Anti-Spyware program seem a bit biased. I have been critical of Microsoft for a number of years now. Why? Because they have been proven repeatedly to behave in a manner quite contradictory to the bevaviour any respected company should behave.

If they are so respectable, then why did they force retailers to refuse to sell PCs that had anything other than Windows on them? Why did they blackmail them by saying that if they sold PCs with Linux, or carried any Apple computers, that they would refuse to allow them rights to sell any computer with Windows in their entire store?

If Microsoft cares so much for security, then why has one of their flagship products, Internet Explorer, been proven time and time again to be a black hole of endless security threats?

Likewise, as stated in the article I posted, if you take the time to read what the author wrote....why then have they decided to classify something that is obviously and blatantly SPYWARE as something that is no threat? Why have they decided to have their own program, designed to protect the privacy of Windows users, configured to ignore that program and leave it on their systems?

As far as Microsoft, yes they refer to themselves by the abbreviation MS....I just choose to use M$ instead as that it is more fitting to their quest of greed and power in the computer world.

Do I hate Microsoft? No. Do I have some overwhelming need for vengeance against them? No. Why am I so critical of them? They have a responsibility. By being the biggest dog in the yard, they have a responsibility to uphold themselves to a much higher standard than any other company. Especially since they have so often gone well out of their way, to squash what chances any other has had at even coming close to their level of near total ownership in the computer world.

Am I some patron saint for Linux? No. Linux is overall not ready for the home computer market for the average computer user. Am I a patron saint for Apple? No. Apple computers are far too expensive for the average computer user to even own one. That being said, I do find many good qualities to Windows, and to other software that Microsoft creates. However, as proven by the article I posted...their motives as of late seem to be suspect.

Do you really want to trust your privacy protection to a company that is already allowing one well documented spyware program to remain on your system, just because they have a vested interest in the company that creates it? How many other such programs might be on that 'ignore' list, that simply haven't been found or documented as of yet? Do you really want a massive systemwide infestation of CoolWebSearch, just because the company that produces that godawful program, offers to sell their advertising rights to Microsoft?

edit: As to game crashing, just try playing Guild Wars sometime with it enabled. I've had many a game either freeze up, or crash, just because one of the pop-up alerts of that program decided it needed to tell me something.

Edited by syntax010
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Even with the alerts on I've never seen it crash a game.

The guy obviously just hates Microsoft and for some reason felt he should rant about it here and obviously didn't test the Beta very well at all.

BTW...you sound like The Comic Book Guy from The Simpsons.

Worst thread EVER!!!!!

Very annoying when people rant about something then come back later to try and say why they said this and that and completey change what they said in the 1st place. You came back seeing that you were proven wrong and now you're saying "well if you had read this" STFU. Don't try to change what you said in the 1st post. You've made it obvious yuo hate Microsoft and you didn't really test Antispyware out like you say you did.

Thanks for the waste of a thread

Edited by halloween_david
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the deal microsoft/ms/M$/micro**** made with Claria, a "research" company, moniters webhabits and such and then sells the info to make more user focus'd ads, but if microsoft is making a deal with them, then its probly going to be so that Microsoft gets the info, and can use it to improve apps and add features, its not getting paid off.

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I just ran SpyBot here in the office before I do anything and there is always at least 1 or 2 in the system. Also I run Ad-Aware which 9 times out of 10 scan clean, but on the odd occasion it finds at least 1 critical object.

So my query is that I thought MS AntiSpyware was supposed to detect and clean spyware before it even gets onto your machine?

:unsure:

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In order to do that, you would have to leave out any HDDs during initialization, and even then, the system partitions are always written to two HDDs when they are eventually added. With three NVMe slots, this also gives an interesting scenario where you could build a TRAID storage Pool for installing all your apps and Docker on, and keep the third for SSD cache on the HDD pool. Limitless options! SATA PCIe 3.0 X1 A CrystalDiskMark test on a mapped network drive from within a Windows 11 25H2 PC (image above) connected over a 5 GbE hub was well within acceptable ranges. Although the read result on SATA was a little less than with the F4-425 Plus, for some reason, while writes were generally better. SATA PCIe 3.0 X1 I also ran the NAS Performance tester, which tests the link speed performance. As you can see, it pretty much maxes out the 5GbE connection. Of course, you can also opt to bond the two 5 GbE connections for a bit more umph, but I didn't do that. TOS 7, which, as of testing, is still in Beta, comes with an App Center that has a bunch of handy programs you can install right off the bat, such as Emby, Plex, Docker, as well as in-house Backup and Surveillance solutions. As you can imagine, any media streaming services you would want to host off the F4-425 Pro will work great, thanks to the Intel Core N350 CPU and its 16 GB of DDR5 memory. Accessing from mobile is only possible if Security Isolation Mode is disabled, which can put your NAS at risk from external sources, so there was no way to access it from the TNAS Mobile app. It's also quiet. I had this sat next to my computer on my work desk for the past week, and I did wonder if the noise I was accustomed to with NAS devices would annoy me, but all I could hear was a soft whirring of the rear fan (which was a little annoying) when the disks were not actively copying or reading data. Conclusion So what have I learned? Unfortunately, this release raises a few important questions and concerns that I feel haven't been adequately addressed. What I didn't like Our variant shipped with TOS 7 beta, and it's advised not to use it in a production environment. I feel that's a bit limiting on an $800 device. The mobile app is also still in beta and does not support some of the first-party apps, like Surveillance, and it still has quite a few bugs. I am a bit confused about the OpenClaw marketing along with the F4-425 Pro. I feel like that if it's going to be a main selling point, then offer official guidance on how to get started with it. TerraMaster recommends enabling SPC, but then markets the NAS for use with OpenClaw, which requires disabling SPC to be able to use it, opening up genuine security concerns for the NAS; and that's before you get into the security concerns of OpenClaw itself. Of course, the above issues won't be a problem if you decide to install something else on it, or even go back to the stable TOS 6. I wish TerraMaster had just given TOS 7 as opt-in rather than shipping with it. TOS 7 has been available as a preview since December 2025 (so well before my last TerraMaster review), and according to a thread on Reddit where a user shared a screenshot from the TerraMaster Facebook page, it is scheduled to launch today, June 23, but there's nothing about that in the TerraMaster news blog. My contact confirmed over email that TOS 7 exits beta today. The rubber feet also deserve a mention as they continue to be a problem, with them coming unstuck the moment you shift the F4-425 Pro anywhere on your desk. What I liked What it comes down to, though, aside from what I already mentioned, you are still getting a quality, affordable device here, so recommending it will depend on the individual's use case. If you're just looking for a relatively small NAS device to manage virtual machines on, backup your files, and take care of your home theater streaming, then it is a great device that will certainly futureproof you for some time. It provides good performance, takes up little space, and is, on the whole, very quiet. Four bays afford proper redundancy using TRAID or RAID 5, and you can even expand on storage capacity by adding the 2-bay D5, or 4-bay D8 Hybrid DAS over a USB 3.2 (10Gbps) link. Considering the 2024 releases were more about power, with the likes of an Intel Core i5-1235U high-end laptop CPU under the hood, I asked my contact last time if we could expect more of the same in higher-end models and was told: It makes a lot of sense to use Intel's N350 chip inside a NAS; it is more than capable of doing what the F4-425 Pro is intended for, media streaming and backup. The only downside is still the clear lack of community and even staff support on the official forums. In the past, I have had topics go unanswered for days, or there would be generic-type "we've noted this and passed it onto our developer team" type responses. Along with the other things I mentioned, it all ends up costing it a couple of points. If you are comfortable with the command line, Docker, and setting up TrueNAS or Unraid, you'll be fine. You can do great things with this hardware. In TOS, the apps are a bit lacking, and things don't always work as expected.\ AI NAS?! What has become clear to me this year is that we are going to start seeing all kinds of "AI NAS" come to market, and while that might be good for us consumers, be diligent and research these claims. Although the F4-425 Pro technically comes with AI, it is really using a cloud service that is externally sourced off-device through the third party OpenClaw app. My colleague did review a newcomer to the NAS space earlier this year, and it includes a local AI assistant inside the Zettlab D4 NAS, and they do not even use AI in the product name, check out Chris' review here. Where to buy and a discount coupon However, it does not change the fact that this is truly a great entry-level home media-class NAS that you can buy right now. TerraMaster is having a 20% off launch discount, plus you can also still apply our unique 10% off coupon on checkout, which only works on the official website. So here is a breakdown of the pricing that is only valid on the official TerraMaster website. TerraMaster F4-425 Pro (N350) + 20% discount + 10% coupon = $575.99 TerraMaster F4-425 Pro (N305) + 20% discount + 10% coupon = $503.99 TerraMaster F4-425 Pro (N350) + 20% discount + 10% coupon = £525.59 TerraMaster F4-425 Pro (N305) + 20% discount + 10% coupon = £460.79 Use NEOWIN coupon code during checkout for 10% discount Over on Amazon US and UK, the F4-425 Pro also gets a 20% launch discount, but here, the above 10% coupon cannot be applied. TerraMaster F4-425 Pro (N350) for $639.99 at Amazon US (was $799.99) TerraMaster F4-425 Pro (N305) for $559.99 at Amazon US (was $699.99) TerraMaster F4-425 Pro (N350) for £583.99 at Amazon UK (was £729.99) TerraMaster F4-425 Pro (N305) for £511.99 at Amazon UK (was £639.99) As an Amazon Associate, when you purchase through links on our site, we earn from qualifying purchases.
    • well you can add a GPU for around $500, that's still around the price of Steam Machine but overall significantly better in performance.
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