I Spy A Community
Last May, the Yahoo! Anti-Spy Community was launched as part of the Yahoo! Toolbar Anti-Spy feature. As the spyware/adware industry has become more profitable, spyware/adware infection has become an increasing threat to unsuspecting web surfers, causing losses in productivity and sometimes ruining our online experience. These pests can slow your computer to a crawl, hijack your web browser, and even spy on your every keystroke.
In the past 11 months, thousands of you have turned to Yahoo!’s Anti-Spy Community for advice on ridding your computers of these unwanted pests. It’s been really gratifying to watch the community grow globally to include people from the U.S., Canada, England, France, El Salvador, the Philippines, and points beyond. A core group of expert members are on hand to offer guidance on how to get rid of unwanted spyware/adware, prevent re-infection and keep our systems running smoothly. Many of these members share knowledge and ideas for no other reason than to help each other.
Because this real-time forum literally never sleeps, information from members often outpaces spyware/adware alerts found in traditional media. A lot of these folks speak from the experience of having been infected by spyware/adware, and their suggestions are tried and tested on their own computers. The experts posting in the Anti-Spy Community gain the trust of others because they’ve been through similar situations themselves. It’s this shared trust that makes the Anti-Spy Community extraordinary.
To help the Anti-Spy Community thrive, we’ve recently made some improvements. Last month we implemented a new message board platform that’s easier to navigate and allows for deeper discussions. We also added message ratings so you can acknowledge helpful posts, as well as message threading which makes it easier to track individual topics. We’ve also added a button to our Anti-Spy application that makes it easier to access the Community once a spyware/adware scan is completed.
If you haven’t checked out the Anti-Spy Community, we invite you to come visit and give us your thoughts. We’re looking forward to further growth and more improvements in the near future and your feedback will help make this an even better, more useful destination.
Carole McManus
Yahoo! Search & Marketplace Communities
The updated message board looks like quite an improvement. Do you plan on also updating the Firefox Toolbar discussion board?
http://messages.yahoo.com/bbs?action=l&board=&tid=firefoxtb&sid=394500317&mid=1000000
- Alex Porter
The Anti-Spy Community is one of the first to move to our new message board platform. It was a natural choice because of the established membership and because the subject matter had a life beyond product feedback. We’ll move other boards to the new platform as appropriate.
By the way, you can also see the new look and feel at http://beta.messages.yahoo.com/
Well, actually I find it rather funny. I went to the Yahoo! Anti-Spy Community earlier today (before I read about it here.) I went through the first few discussions and there was this guy complaining about his inability to remove pop-ups even after using Yahoo toolbar. The suggestions included using Spybot Search and Destroy and some dozen other softwares. Now having personally used SS&D and not being able to remove spyware problem from two of my friends PC I installed Yahoo! toolbar and it worked. Obviously this proves that all Anti Spyware programs have small problems. What I find funny though is that the Yahoo! Anti-Spy Community is not so much about using Yahoo! toolbar as much as about problems related to PCs including Mouse that freeze and The Jack Schitt story (with 4 stars mind you) and the occasional SS&D public advert. Anyway, as long as it helps people it is worth it.
I am a big Yahoo! fan but I must concede that unmoderated message boards (aka “communities”) attract the dregs of the earth. Loathsome bitter self-involved sociopathic morons who thrive in their anonymity.
I must also concede that the Yahoo! Anti-Spy Community is not among the roosts for the aforementioned group.
But after perusing the posts at the Yahoo! Anti-Spy Community boards, I saw a lot of misinformation and misdirection and very few, if any, that rang of posts from experts in this field.
I am sure there is nothing but best intentions behind these posts but all the same they leave those who turn to this community for assistance exposed to risk, unable to properly address their concerns and frustrated at inadequate responses presented by novices who feel the one solution to their problem is the same for everyone else’s problems.
This cheapens the Yahoo! experience almost as much as the News message boards. But not quite as much. ;-)
Joe
Hi,
Where can i find information on where spyware and research differs.
Regards,
David.
jbeaul, I’ve seen your posts on some of other boards– thank you for your contributions. It would be great if you joined in the discussions if you can pinpoint specific misinformation.
For the most part, I see a lot of “your mileage may vary” caveats posted throughout the Anti-Spy board, and many of the regulars taking pains to inform users that they should be careful with any information they receive in any public forum.
David, you can start with Spyware Central http://yahoo.pcworld.com/yahoo/browse/0,cat,1713,sortIdx,1,00.asp and Yahoo’s Security Center http://security.yahoo.com/spyware.html. Check Computer Associates’ Spyware Information Center http://www3.ca.com/securityadvisor/pest/ to get the latest info on spyware threats.
testing again… something is wonky
I cannot use the video or audio fron the sbc yahoo dsl services. I use linux and this is the reason. You idiots want me to use your software! well f-u. I would never go back to windoze. I never use yahoo search. I kept from updating my email to sbcyahoo for 3 years. Then you fulled my relative into upgrading my contract. Six more months baby. I feel like I am in cyber jail! I got a useless connection and I got to pay 200 bucks if I want out!
people this is SBC but also it is Pacbell, yahoo, sbcglobal, and now AT$T and verizon. all at the same time. I am tired of these companies. NO matter how many times they change their name, their only purpose is to give us bad services that cost too much. Boycott these MFers!! at all costs. call their phone and flood them untill they can’t serve even if they wanted. then sue their pants off for breach of contract!!!
Yahoo toolbar is cool. Love it!
that anti spy is very useful. I use it everyday
I like the yahoo search toolbar better. This way you don’t have to go back yahoo home page and do the search. One less step.
Most tools made by big search engines are good in general.