Internet dialers

Can any one tell me of a free download that will stop or warn someone of a internet dialer.

A friend got quite a phone bill and it was from a web site that dialed and charged his phone # when he visited the web site.
This happened without his knowledge and did not know he was being charged.
He got the phone company to drop the charges, but would now like some software to let him know if and when this is happening again.

Thanks
Geri

 

First, I would download SpyBot from here and run it regularly. Then I would get a firewall. I use Kerio, other folks here run ZoneAlarm. These all have free versions.

 

hi Geri

all three of these tools are effective against online dialers...

Spybot

SpywareBlaster

Ad-aware

fwiw, i use all three in tandem. SpywareBlaster prevents spyware from installing itself, whereas the other two products go in and remove it after-the-fact. i have found that Spybot and Ad-aware have a lot less work to do because of the addition of SpywareBlaster to my security plan.

hth



mark

 

Hi
I downloaded spyware blaster also had to download one of the files from their site MSCOMCTL.

When I shut down my computer for the night I got a number of fatal exceptions.
I don't remember all of them, this only happened the first time I shut down.

Any ideas why this would have happened?

Also
I'm using Sygate firewall (free one) are the others a better firewall?
Can anyone direct me to a site that explains which port on my computer is for what usage.
I would like to know which port the dial up modem uses.

Thanks
Geri

 

Good list of IP Gaming Ports is Here.

List of the "well known" or standard ports is Here.

Your modem by itself doesn't use a "port ". Only traffic from applications (like FTP) and other internet stuff. The port is simply a number added on to the end of your IP address when an internet packet is sent or received.

For example, if your system dialed in and the ISP assigned it an address of 20.30.40.50, your browser using http (on port 80) would deal with 20.30.40.50:80 while email you sent (via SMTP) would be addressed from 20.30.40.50:110 and mail you got (POP3) would be addressed to you at 20.30.40.50:25.

Firewalls basically work by opening or closing the ports so that if you had port 80 closed, you'd never be able to use your browser with Http. Closing 25 & 110 would put you out of the email business.

Good firewalls can allow traffic in to a list of ports you select and allow traffic out to a list of different ports you select.

Really good (stateful) firewalls will watch port 80 traffic (for instance) to make sure it all seems to be browser stuff and block any that looks different even though you allow the port for it's proper traffic. So even if your firewall is set to allow browser traffic, if a trojan or something tries to use that port for evil deeds, you'll be alerted.