Posted on 02/02/2005 7:23:03 AM PST by holymoly
Adware infections net the purveyors of slimeware software around $3 a year for each infected PC, according to estimates from anti-spyware firm Webroot Software. Using this figure and stats from its own malware auditing services, Webroot guesstimates the illicit advertising market underpinned by adware infection of home and business PCs could be worth up to $1.6bn a year.
According to Richard Stiennon, VP of threat research at Webroot, the illicit ad market enjoys approximately the same growth rate as the legitimate market. But that's where the similarities end. "It [adware] has a similar bus model and some of the same affiliates as the spam industry. Adware is not just used to serve up ads for penis pills though. Sometimes legitimate companies - whether they realise it or not - purchase ad views from adware firms," he said.
It's hard to square Webroot's $1.6bn estimate with the observable size of adware market. The company looks to be on much firmer ground in working out how much adware agent makes its owner, because its assumptions derive from the public disclosure of firms operating in the market.
Stiennon notes that adware company Avenue Media claims the 2m PCS running its software brought in $7m of revenue per year in its lawsuit against rival DirectRevenue, whose VX2 package allegedly disables Avenue Media's software. Claria (the firm formerly known as Gator) revealed that its software was loaded onto 40m PCs, bringing in $90m in revenue a year in public fillings made in 2003.
From these two data points we get an estimate that each item of adware generates between $2.25 and $3.50 per year from each infected PC. That's an average of $2.95 per-infection-per-year, Stiennon says in a recent opinion piece on CIO Update. But simply averaging the two figures is a questionable statistical assumption and worse is to follow.
Stat attack
Webroot's spy audit suggests an average PC on the net (whatever that is) has at "least two pieces of adware on it". ClickZ Stats indicate that there are 280m active PCs on the internet. Multiplying the number of PCs by the average number of adware items on each by the revenue per app figure allows Stiennon to guesstimate that the illicit advertising market is worth $1.6bn a year.
This calculation assumes a uniform distribution of spyware, among other statistical sins. Estimates on the damage caused by malware are a notoriously inexact science. The same seems to apply to looking at the adware market.
Stiennon told El Reg that machines loaded with more than three pieces of adware slow down to the extent they are less effective cash generators. This may be the case but we remain unconvinced about Webroot's headline figure for the illicit ad market of $1.6bn, which it compares to the $10bn a year pulled in by Google, Yahoo! DoubleClick et al. ®
My FR homepage has some information that may be useful. Have you tried the Microsoft beta tool? It works pretty well.
I don't know, but some of it is handled for free by Mozilla/FireFox.
I got the greatest little spy camera....
I find that multiple spy killers are better than one. Try the Microsoft Anti-spyware Beta. It got rid of an infection for me that Ad-Aware failed to get rid of. But, Spybot S&D found some things that MS Anti-spyware missed.
How do I uninstall and find a new version?
Thanks, and please keep in mind I'm feebleminded.
LOLOLOLOLOLOL.......OOOOOOOHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH
I'm on Windows 98........boo hoo.........
Go to "Control Panel" and "Add/Remove Programs"
You'll find an option there.
Then google for Adaware and download the newest version.
With Spybot, go to Mode => Advanced. Then select File Sets on the right and click the Usage Tracking check boxes.
That's kind of like a protection racket. That's probably actionable under RICO.
I just downloaded the spybot thing and once it was finished, before I run it, a warning came up from IE saying the publisher could not be verified....is that a bad thing?
No, sometimes Microsoft's own stuff causes that to come up. If it is Spybot Search & Destroy you should be ok, just means the author didn't pay a fee to Microsoft.
As a side note, it's threads like these that make me snicker everytime some microsoft astroturfer trots out the "Linux is only free if you don't value your time" line.
ping for later
OK. Thank you very much. Besides posting pictures, turning this thing on and off and hitting the print button, that's my total knowledge of computers....pathetic huh? Thanks again.
for later
How come I did not get the benefits upon refi? I guess I did not use the coupon.
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