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From: Jose on 23 May 2010 13:01
On May 23, 12:01 pm, aries <ar...(a)discussions.microsoft.com> wrote:
> I am concerned because I have not received a response from my inquiry.  I had
> even reported it through the microsoft product support section, for which a
> number was displayed as confirmation, but no email response has been received.
>
> Thanks so much...  Until this incident I have been VERY PLEASED with
> Microsoft support.  Now I am suspecting a virus or something intercepting my
> requests because I can't imagine that Microsoft would not respond to my
> concerns...
>
> Unless I get some kind of response the only thing I can do is speculate 1..
> That Microsoft policies have changed regarding customer support or 2. That
> there is some kind of interference.
>
> It looks like the Microsoft reporting webpage for security issues has been
> having a problem for some time.  See this link:
>
> https://support.microsoft.com/oas/default.aspx?LN=en-us&prid=7552&act....
>
> These were the issues which prompted my initial concerns:
>
> When I started working one night last week after reviving it from
> hibernation, I noticed that the network icon had a red x on it.  I could not
> right click because the system was so busy with something.  After a while the
> icon disappeared altogether, although I am now connected.
>
> Also, I noticed when I went to save a MSword 2003 document earlier today,
> when I clicked "save as" it opened up the OFFICE folder and not the most
> recent document folder that I had used.
>
> Also, a few days ago when I clicked "open" to open a file in Word, the
> sorting was unexpectedly "today", "last month", "two months ago" and not
> "name", "type", "size" and "modified" as I usually have it.  When I tried to
> sort by name it would not change the displayed sorting.  I must tell you that
> I have no idea how to change the way the files are displayed and I did not
> initiate any change, although I did do updates recently on the Microsoft
> Update site, and they included Office updates.  The only file open window
> which was normal was the Recent section.  I sent an email to Microsoft about
> it, a support number displayed but I haven't heard anything back from
> Microsoft.
>
> The next day when I went to open a Word file it was back to normal.  I
> didn't do anything other than run MSE.  MSE reported no problems.  
>
> Also a few weeks ago I was having an issue with my printer skewing the top
> part of a print job.  None of my efforts to resolve it worked.  After I had
> started using another printer one of my kids told me it was working ok and I
> checked it, sure enough it was resolved.
>
> Obviously there is something going on.  I am running MyHeritage  Family Tree
> Builder software which has some bugs in it that they claim they are working
> on.  I don't know if that has anything to do with it or not.  Since it seems
> to span multiple applications, I think now it might be a security issue.
>
> I have run MSE two times in the last week and each time it reports no
> problems being found.

If you suspect malicious software, expand your malicious software
horizons outside the MS world.

MS is not in the business of malicious software detection and
removal. It is not their job, it is not their business, it is not
their specialty.

There are people that do make malicious software detection and removal
their business almost exclusively:

Download, install, update and do a full scan with these free malware
detection programs:

Malwarebytes (MBAM): http://malwarebytes.org/
SUPERAntiSpyware: (SAS): http://www.superantispyware.com/

They can be uninstalled later if desired.

If you still have issues, do this:

To eliminate questions and guessing, please provide additional
information about your system.

Click Start, Run and in the box enter:

msinfo32

Click OK, and when the System Summary info appears, click Edit, Select
All, Copy and then paste the information back here.

There will be some personal information (like System Name and User
Name), and whatever appears to be private information to you, just
delete it from the pasted information.
From: James Silverton on 23 May 2010 14:08
Jose wrote on Sun, 23 May 2010 10:01:28 -0700 (PDT):

> MS is not in the business of malicious software detection and
> removal. It is not their job, it is not their business, it is
> not their specialty.

Hmmh! Every second MS update that I install seems to be a "Malicious
Software Removal Tool".

--

James Silverton
Potomac, Maryland

Email, with obvious alterations: not.jim.silverton.at.verizon.not

From: Jose on 23 May 2010 16:18
On May 23, 2:08 pm, "James Silverton" <not.jim.silver...(a)verizon.net>
wrote:
>  Jose  wrote  on Sun, 23 May 2010 10:01:28 -0700 (PDT):
>
> > MS is not in the business of malicious software detection and
> > removal.  It is not their job, it is not their business, it is
> > not their specialty.
>
> Hmmh! Every second MS update that I install seems to be a "Malicious
> Software Removal Tool".
>
> --
>
> James Silverton
> Potomac, Maryland
>
> Email, with obvious alterations: not.jim.silverton.at.verizon.not

Well, they do come out with a lot of Security Updates, but that is
because they have so many security vulnerability holes to plug.

As soon as MS plugs one hole, somebody finds another and exploits it,
or figures out a way around the previous patch. This in the nature of
authors of malicious software. Malicious software could be a lot
worse, but for me it is mostly just annoying. If it wanted to be
malicious, it would delete your My Documents or My Pictures or My
Music folder. Mostly, it just keeps you from booting, takes you
browsing so places you don't want to go, makes your program suddenly
not work the way they used to. Annoying but hardly malicious. Of
course there are a few exceptions... Mostly, the malicious software
is boring but sometimes it is cute and somewhat creative - if you are
still in high school.

Some folks just dump MS altogether and go with a different operating
system that does not have so many vulnerabilities. That's always an
option.

MS is so popular though, it is an easy target and easy to practice
your malicious software writing skills on. Malicious software will
thwart the usual methods you might use to find and delete it. It will
stop you from being able to use Task Manager, regedit, System Restore,
Safe Mode, a command prompt - or if you decide to Google the problem,
your Internet is now broken if it still works, you will never be able
to get to google.com and end up some page they want you to see and
tell you your system is infected, please give me your CC information
and I will fix it for you. It knows what most people will do to try
to find and remove it and it knows how to threaten effectively and
convincingly and that there are a lot of naive people using Windows
XP.

If you get MBAM.exe or SAS, it knows about that too, recognizes it and
will not let you run it or even install it. Then malicious software
started learning what the good detection and removal tools are and
won't let you get to their WWW site to download, if you get there, it
won't let them install and if you get it installed it won't let it
run. Believe me - it has nothing to fear from MSE - it knows MSE is
weak and only detects a small list of threats in certain files, so it
just does something that MSE doesn't know about.

Malicious software is really the happiest when it fools you into
thinking you have to reinstall XP because your system will not boot,
or you have to use a Repair Install or a Restore Point, or move your
HDD to another system or boot on some Linux CD to try to fix your
system (if that even works). Some of those concepts are beyond the
knowledge of a lot of users. Then it has won the battle and you are
frustrated while it is laughing at the simple thing it did that causes
you so much grief. It will not win over here, I can tell you that.
Annoyingware is what I call it.

I just have less than zero expectations for the MS malicious software
detection and removal tools. I think the only reason they offer such
a thing is because they had to some up with something so people would
not yell at them for producing an operating system that is so full of
holes and not include some free tool to remove the things that get
past their defenses. They have a lot of holes to plug, new holes are
found all the time, so new updates come out - but they will not last
forever.

The MSE was interesting once but the last time I looked at it
carefully (a long time ago), the MS detection and removal tools only
care about the 3498 files that Microsoft thinks are important. It
doesn't care about the files that you think are important and I have a
lot more files and conditions on my system that I would like to have
checked. I can get infected on purpose 10 different ways and MSE will
tell me my system is clean. I don't even try it anymore.

So, it makes sense to me to use tools written by people where that is
the only thing they do.
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