New Google Earth requires you to allow automatic updates

Google Earth ^ | 03/06/09 | Self

[Aliska]

I so wish I’d put in another number, any old one, and wouldn’t maliciously choose one for somebody I might not like, deliberately at least. Better yet, just gotten out of the da*n thing. That’s funny about Dial-A-Prayer!

[Bloody Sam Roberts]

********Security Alert!********

For those who are interested in stopping Google from tracking all you see and do on the Web....here is some info and a weapon.

I recently installed a Firefox add on called Ghostery. This little jewel alerts you about the web bugs, ad networks and widgets on every page on the web with a small popup on the page you are viewing. Since installing it, I have noticed this popping up on every page I go to:

So I did some research and found that this insidious little bastard is a Java script that is initiated by code placed within the web site's html.
The obvious answer is to disable Java script...however, this did not work for me as I still received the pop up and...good or bad...I need to have Java script enabled.

I then turned to an old friend who has been running in the background on all my PCs for years...The Proxomitron.

This is a Proxy server that runs on my PC and allows me to shunt all connections through it on port 8080. I can also edit the Ad blocking Killfile it uses and in doing so can add this tidbit:

[^.]+.google-analytics.com/

Now when I visit webpages, the Google Analytics pop up no longer appears as Ghostery sees nothing happening because the Google Analytics website has been blocked by The Proxomitron.

This is easy to setup but if anyone is interested in doing it and needs an assist, just Freepmail me.

Of course, this is a Windows related fix. I haven't tried Ghostery in Firefox on my Linux Mint OS yet but I imagine that the Google Analytics will appear there as well. I'll have to figure out how to deal with it there later.

[longtermmemmory]

english translation?

[Bloody Sam Roberts]

english translation?

1. Install the Proxomitron. It's free, it's harmless and it makes good sense.
2. Set it up per the instructions on the help page.
3. Add "[^.]+.google-analytics.com/" to the Ad Killfile within Proxomitron.
4. Sit back and relax since you just told Google to piss off.

[rockrr]

I use ZoneAlarm as my laptop firewall and every time a new program runs for the first time and tries to access the Internet ZoneAlarm pops up and seeks permission. On almost all of these programs I just deny it.

Google can run its program to its hearts content - it just can’t communicate with its host site. This doesn’t affect functionality of the app at all - just won’t let it update...

[Swordmaker]

In the next few months I am going to buy my first laptop. Can you recommend a good Apple product.

I suggest checking out the Apple Refurbished Store... the computers are sold with the same warranty as new ones and you can save several hundred dollars. I bought my 24 inch iMac this way last month ... the $1799 (new price) computer was sold to me for just $1299 including everything you get with a new iMac except the fancy box. (Rats, I just checked and the model I bought is now available for just $1199! But then, they have also dropped the new retail price.)

They currently have a refurbished 13.3inch 2.1GHz MacBook (White) for just $849.

If you have a student or a teacher or anyone someway connected to education in your family, then you can shop the Apple Education Shop. That shop offers discounts on Apple products for around a 10% discount or so.

[Star Traveler]

Thanks for the suggestions...

[Petronski]

Hopefully, you still have the 4.0 installer. It still works (for now).

GE 5.0 on my computer crashed more spectacularly than the Obamaconomy.

[mysterio]

Run Msconfig. Disable the google updaters from startup. Some computers have multiple google updaters running at the same time. I don’t see why it’s necessary for that to be running all of the time, so I disabled it. Problem solved.

[uglybiker]

Google Earth is a resource hog. If you absolutely have to use it, just click 'MAPS' on the google home page.

[Golden Eagle]

Looks like an excellent, well rounded, layered set of protections you itemized there in post #29. I have a brand new Macbook Pro, and I’ll probably be in market for some of those tools later as well, but for now am testing the “Apple’s are impenatrable” inferrence we commonly hear and enjoying the great performance.

So before I bog this thing down with all those port trackers and blockers like I have (and actually need) on my Windows systems, since you have all that capability active, can you perhaps answer what may be causing the Mac to constantly attempt incrementing UDP port scans on the network in the 40,000 - 50,000 range?

I’m logging a few new hits through that range every minute or so on all the other systems on my network, and this is the only reference I’ve been able to find on the internet so far, but it sounds like the exact same thing I’m seeing:

http://discussions.apple.com/thread.jspa?threadID=1478203

As that poster said I’ve been seeing this on a new system that doesn’t have much on it, although I did load Firefox as that poster indicated as well. Thanks in advance for any ideas you may have. Little Snitch is already downloaded but I’m really wanting to keep this thing clean as long as possible. Thanks again.

[Star Traveler]

You asked — “So before I bog this thing down with all those port trackers and blockers like I have (and actually need) on my Windows systems, since you have all that capability active, can you perhaps answer what may be causing the Mac to constantly attempt incrementing UDP port scans on the network in the 40,000 - 50,000 range?”

—

I could have the firewall log all the UDP port accesses, too..., but I don’t do that right now. But, if I were suspicious of something, I would activate it and watch the log.

I’ve had some things that have been going on for short times and I wonder and try to run it down, just to have it stop after a short while and then I don’t know what it was.

It is a complex system and many times it is communicating “with itself” and it may look like something else is going on.

The long and short of it, is that I don’t know right off the top of my head. However, if you were to go to the Apple Support Board and go to the operating system section [I just saw that you did go there...], usually some smart people hang out there and one of them may be able to answer your question.

I’m still trying to get a list of all the normally operating processes that are supposed to be running on the Mac, and that changes a lot, too..., depending on what you have installed in the way of programs. It takes a lot of work to get to know what is going on in your system. Sometimes I think it’s better to “not know” and live life easier... LOL... (but I can’t do that...).

But, you might check “Bonjour” and see how that operates... (it’s part of the system). I think I’ve got Bonjour blocked right now, through the firewall. But, I also found that some things won’t work and I sometimes have to unblock it.

Bonjour information from Apple...
http://www.apple.com/support/bonjour/

—

I also have noticed that in some places with public and free WiFi, my computer logs repeated accesses through certain ports, which is the Windows version of Bonjour, I think. At times, I’ve blocked those Windows port scans, too. It was “reported” as not dangerous, but I still didn’t want to be logged on their system.

[Golden Eagle]

Thanks, the Bonjour traffic seems to be locked on port 5353, while these are incrementing 1 port up at at time just the way a port scanner typically operates, but not really a full port scan as it seems to be limited to the 40,000 and low 50,000 range, which is why I’ve not been too concerned yet. Little Snitch is supposed to track down this exact kind of issue, and probably will, but having to go through all the traffic and label it as either good or bad is so Windows like, and something I was hoping to avoid with this new system, at least here right off the bat. That’s one reason I’m stalling, but I’ve also seen lots of complaints that the Little Snitch uninstaller doesn’t really fully remove it, and you have to jump down the command line and manually remove some things if I decide I don’t want to keep/pay for it. No big deal but as I said this thing is running great right now and I don’t really feel like monkeying with it, at all.

But thanks again for your quick response, I pinged Swordmaker as well in case he has any ideas.

[Star Traveler]

You were saying — “That’s one reason I’m stalling, but I’ve also seen lots of complaints that the Little Snitch uninstaller doesn’t really fully remove it, and you have to jump down the command line and manually remove some things if I decide I don’t want to keep/pay for it. No big deal but as I said this thing is running great right now and I don’t really feel like monkeying with it, at all.”

Well..., if you want to test out some software, first, before deciding to buy it, you could test out Little Snitch and Clean App. I think Clean App will remove all of a program (if it works right, of course..., not always absolutely guaranteed, but it should work). I believe Little Snitch is fully functional for 30 days, but I may be wrong.

And.., if you wanted to get an operating version of Clean App, you can go the route of BitTorrent and to The Pirate Bay and get a torrent download of Clean App. I have bought all my programs, but there are times when I don’t want to buy without really testing something out, first. And so, that always works for me.

You can use “Transmission” for your BitTorrent client...
http://www.transmissionbt.com/

Be sure to activate the “blocklist” of IP numbers in the preferences panel of Transmission to eliminate a lot of “tracking sources” from your IP numbers, plus other bad sources.

I’ve never had any problems with Transmission or The Pirate Bay. They’ve got a Mac programs section there. Sometimes they are overloaded on their search function and it stalls, so I use Google to search their site, instead of their own search engine.

The Pirate Bay
http://thepiratebay.org/

Mac Applications section
http://thepiratebay.org/browse/302

[Golden Eagle]

I’ll pass on the Pirate Bay recommendation, that’s one of the few places that’s known to carry Mac trojans like the iWork 09 one. Good idea on the Clean App though, one of the very first things I installed was App Zapper, based on the recommendation of others and the great reviews online, and while Little Snitch actually includes and uninstaller apparently it leaves active daemons behind, do you know if either of these clean up programs will clean those up as well? Worst case is probably having to go down to the command line. Thanks again for your recommendations.

http://forums.mactalk.com.au/13/58930-little-snitch-problem.html

http://www.macupdate.com/info.php/id/10426?rord=mod

ROBOBOT For anyone else that has problems removing the UIAgent after uninstalling Little Snitch:

I had to open up a terminal and open launchctl.

enter “list” to see the daemons controlled by launchd.

I had a LittleSnitchUI daemon as well as a LittleSnitchNeworkMonitor daemon, even after I uninstalled!

Enter remove for each one you want to remove.

[Star Traveler]

You said — “I’ll pass on the Pirate Bay recommendation, that’s one of the few places that’s known to carry Mac trojans like the iWork 09 one.”

Well, it was overblown... There wasn’t a real big problem. I actually seeded the iWork 09 there at The Pirate Bay. It was taking so long to download it, that I just went to the Apple site, got the disk image downloaded and inserted it into the torrent file (in Transmission) and started seeding it to a lot of others. It really was no big deal.

The very same file that was on Apple’s site, which they were giving out for free — was on The Pirate Bay. I’m not sure why there were a lot of people getting it there. Maybe Apple’s servers were overloaded the first few days.

I ended up getting another security program, as a result of that story which checks for trojans and other hidden programs on your computer. I ran it and nothing came up. I always keep at least two full hard drive backups that are bootable and I can clean something off relatively quickly, if I have to.

And, the one thing you have in your benefit at the Pirate Bay are the comments from the users on each particular file there. If there is a problem, you’ll get comments from other users in a matter of hours. If you see a file that has been there for a few days or more, there’s no problem. It would have shown up in the user comments right away. So, you really can’t go too wrong there...

—

And then you said — “Good idea on the Clean App though, one of the very first things I installed was App Zapper, based on the recommendation of others and the great reviews online, and while Little Snitch actually includes and uninstaller apparently it leaves active daemons behind, do you know if either of these clean up programs will clean those up as well? Worst case is probably having to go down to the command line.”

I’ve never removed Little Snitch, so I don’t know if it won’t actually remove all the processes. But, if it doesn’t, you’ll see the process and you can kill it. But, I’m sure you would want to get rid of the file that was originating it, too... :-) ...

In regards to whether those programs will clean out those files... well... “they’re supposed to...” but I’m not going to go out on a limb and say they always do it... :-)

—

And lastly, you said — “Thanks again for your recommendations.”

Well, one more recommendation...

You can change your DNS server lookups to — OpenDNS [ http://www.opendns.com/ ]

It will block phishing sites and other problem sites for you. I’ve been using it for a while and haven’t run into any problems. It’s easy to use, just changing some IP numbers. The website will tell you how...

You can set this hard-coded IP number in a particular “setting” and name it, so you can easily switch back and forth from using it, to not using it, in a matter of seconds. So, if you think it may be causing a problem, you can switch back to the original settings for DNS lookups and see if it’s really the problem.

I hope you’re having fun on your Mac. I’m always glad to see people using Macs. They’re a lot better, I think. Maybe one of these days I’ll also get to be a UNIX geek, too... LOL...

[Golden Eagle]

Thanks, this is a great machine, as is, which is why I don’t want to change much, at least not yet. I was disappointed I couldn’t change the mouse color though, which was the first thing I tried. Knowing me one weekend when I have time, I’ll make a backup, then load everything I can find and test it, then go back to the backup and install just the things I really want. Right now though I’m just running the basic provided firewall, but turned on Stealth and set allowed incoming to only essential, from the default of allow all. I’ll eventually load some more security filtering and blocking, but that takes resources and time, and right now this thing will boot up completely in about 15 seconds, and shuts off in less than 5, and I’m enjoying that.

[Star Traveler]

Oh yeah! A new machine is great like that... good luck on everything.

[Cringing Negativism Network]

Mind if I ask a Linux Mint question please?

Anyone else encountering a warning from Mint Update, indicating a failed authentication?

Seems likely the “out of the box” install wouldn’t have any malware links, but it’s still a bit disconcerting.

Ubuntu doesn’t do this. Any idea what the warn is about?

[Bloody Sam Roberts]

I’ve never encountered any warnings from a Mint update. I don’t know what that could be about. The only warnings of any type I’ve seen is using the Software Manager and getting some warnings about certain packages that have not been fully tested on Mint....but nothing about Mint updates. Sorry.