Resurrection After Rape Community Group
Discussion, question-and-answer, general social support, and journal processing for progress-oriented rape survivors. No crisis, no damaging or triggering conflicts--this is for individuals who want to contribute to collective, cooperative action toward the goal of making actual PROGRESS through rape trauma. Much of this work is based on the book "Resurrection After...
Butterfly9 texted to me to say that DS gave her computer a virus. This seemed surprising to me, since a virus usually has to be activated from an application to install, although in RARE cases a website can infect a PC with one. When that happens, though, the website itself is intentionally programmed to do that; it's malice on the part of the site owners. I have a hard time thinking the owners of DS are writing virus code into their html (and besides, those viruses are usually javascript or active-x, neither of which DS uses).
I checked this entire site using two different site security scanners, comodo and virustotal (these are the "gold standard" of site verification systems). Virustotal did 16 different scans of DS and found no viruses or malware. Comodo also found no virus or malware on the entire server that DS uses.
Which means DS is safe.
Still here's some helpful info on virus safety. Butterfly9 said that her virus was disguised as an AVG software update, and that it tried to get her to change her windows settings. Those are the two CLASSIC ploys a virus will use to trick you into activating it. AVG updates are never in the form of popups, they're either scheduled by the user to be automatic, or they're done manually. Any time a popup warns you to install something because "your computer may be at risk" or promises a patch to heal an infection, that is ALWAYS, 100% of the time, no exceptions, malware at work. NO anti-virus software does that, not AVG, not McAfee, not any of 'em. Don't fall for it. Also when that does happen, it is not caused by the website you're looking it. It's a previous infection generating that popup to get you to allow it to access your registry, and whatever website you're looking at that moment is just a coincidence.
To be well-defended, set your antivirus software to update automatically, and never let a popup urge you to download an update or change your windows settings. Don't install active-x from a website that claims it needs it to run; if you must use active-x controls install them from the Microsoft site itself (ah, the joys of Windows. I remember those days). Keep your java and Windows patches up to date. And the MOST common browser that viruses exploit is Internet Explorer, which I've mercilessly mocked here before. People still use it at their own peril. Or, ultimately, get a Mac. All this "virus" stuff is from memory of the old days; Mac owners don't have those decoy "download a path/update your windows settings/click OK to start scan" viruses.
I checked this entire site using two different site security scanners, comodo and virustotal (these are the "gold standard" of site verification systems). Virustotal did 16 different scans of DS and found no viruses or malware. Comodo also found no virus or malware on the entire server that DS uses.
Which means DS is safe.
Still here's some helpful info on virus safety. Butterfly9 said that her virus was disguised as an AVG software update, and that it tried to get her to change her windows settings. Those are the two CLASSIC ploys a virus will use to trick you into activating it. AVG updates are never in the form of popups, they're either scheduled by the user to be automatic, or they're done manually. Any time a popup warns you to install something because "your computer may be at risk" or promises a patch to heal an infection, that is ALWAYS, 100% of the time, no exceptions, malware at work. NO anti-virus software does that, not AVG, not McAfee, not any of 'em. Don't fall for it. Also when that does happen, it is not caused by the website you're looking it. It's a previous infection generating that popup to get you to allow it to access your registry, and whatever website you're looking at that moment is just a coincidence.
To be well-defended, set your antivirus software to update automatically, and never let a popup urge you to download an update or change your windows settings. Don't install active-x from a website that claims it needs it to run; if you must use active-x controls install them from the Microsoft site itself (ah, the joys of Windows. I remember those days). Keep your java and Windows patches up to date. And the MOST common browser that viruses exploit is Internet Explorer, which I've mercilessly mocked here before. People still use it at their own peril. Or, ultimately, get a Mac. All this "virus" stuff is from memory of the old days; Mac owners don't have those decoy "download a path/update your windows settings/click OK to start scan" viruses.
Here's what I learned from my research on how to get rid of it: The infection is a roque antivirus program that evades most antivirus software very successfully. It manifests in different forms under many different names. In my case, it appeared as a Windows Antispyware Update -- pretty authentic looking, I might add. However it had enough red flags that it was not legit that I knew to steer clear. I was able to get rid of it fairly quickly, but I think the fact that I caught it right away definitely made a difference. Apparently, the longer it "lives" the deeper it digs into your system and the more difficult it is to remove. Supposedly, Malwarebytes Anti-Malware or Spyware Doctor are able to catch it. BleepingComputer provides removal instructions. FWIW.
FinalyTime, Safari does have a downloadable adblocker, but you can also use Firefox. I prefer Firefox immensely, although I use Safari sometimes when I just want to do something very quickly. If you opt for Firefox, be sure to add the AdBlock add-on. Works like a charm.
Matt and others - it is possible for a website to be clean of viruses and malware and still play a role in virus dissemination. If a website is not careful about how it filters data before saving it to the database, then the data in the database can include a link to a malicious script on an entirely different website. When an unsuspecting user retrieves the data they may unwittingly also run the script.
See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cross-site_scripting .