Author Archives: halberenson

How long does it take to get infected with Malware? About 5 minutes

Posted on May 12, 2011 by halberenson

Having a freshly setup PC, and virtual machine, I went looking for trouble.  I did a search for “medical forum” and up popped a link for medhelp.org.  I went to the site and created an account and then started navigating … Continue reading →

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SenderID Followup

Posted on May 12, 2011 by halberenson

I wanted to do a bit of a followup to my earlier SenderID post both to better capture the comments and make another observation.  First I wanted to bring John Scarrow’s comment to the front of the discussion.  John is … Continue reading →

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Is Skype really worth $8.5B to Microsoft?

Posted on May 10, 2011 by halberenson

$8.5B seems rather expensive to me, but I can understand why Microsoft would want Skype.  And I don’t think it is primarily for the reasons most people are saying. First of all, recognize that Microsoft already has two competing products.  … Continue reading →

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Bing going Mobile

Posted on May 4, 2011 by halberenson

Yesterday we had the announcement that Bing would become the default Search and Mapping solution for the next generation of RIM’s Blackberry.  Over the previous year we’ve seen Microsoft introduce excellent Bing apps for the iPhone and more recently iPad, work … Continue reading →

Posted in Computer and Internet, Google, Microsoft, Mobile, Search | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 3 Comments

Is Hotmail’s “Trusted Sender” feature more than just show?

Posted on May 3, 2011 by halberenson

One year ago Microsoft introduced a feature in Hotmail that marked mail from a set of “trusted senders”, primarily banks, with a Trusted Sender icon.  The idea was that if mail from your bank was marked with the icon you … Continue reading →

Posted in Computer and Internet, Microsoft, Phishing, Privacy | Tagged , , , , , | 2 Comments

Has Microsoft put the nail in the coffin on SenderID?

Posted on May 2, 2011 by halberenson

A funny thing happened on my way to some research on Anti-SPAM technologies, I found that Microsoft is wiping SenderID information from its website.  When you try going to the web page for the SenderID Framework you are now redirected to a … Continue reading →

Posted in Computer and Internet, Microsoft, Security | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | 9 Comments

Old Operating Systems never die, and it seems they don’t fully fade away either

Posted on April 29, 2011 by halberenson

In Time and Malware I mention that very old malware is still with us.  That made me curious about just how many PCs are still running pre-XP versions of Microsoft Windows (e.g., Windows 98).  The data from a number of sources … Continue reading →

Posted in Computer and Internet, Microsoft, Security, Windows | Tagged , , , , | 1 Comment

This one doesn’t count

Posted on April 28, 2011 by halberenson

Right after posting “Time and Malware” I was looking at my blog site on Google’s Webmaster Tools and decided to check out a site that was linking to mine. BLAM! That web site tried to install the Adclicker Trojan on … Continue reading →

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Time and Malware

Posted on April 28, 2011 by halberenson

I’m in the process of setting up a PC that I’m going to use exclusively for playing around with malware.  In fact, I’m thinking of starting a pool to capture people’s guesses as to how long it takes someone who … Continue reading →

Posted in Computer and Internet, Security | Tagged , , , | 1 Comment

Why haven’t we seen a Microsoft Windows Application Store?

Posted on April 25, 2011 by halberenson

If you talk to Microsoft veterans you can find many who either proposed, or actually worked on, Windows application stores dating back to the 1990s.  None of these actually shipped.  There are now plenty of leaks out on the web … Continue reading →

Posted in Computer and Internet, Microsoft, Windows | Tagged , , , | 1 Comment