gator problems....

[trulyred]

Have any of you tangled with a program called gator?? If you come across it, stay away from it!! it is sticky as all get out ,and is very hard to get rid of. In fact im not sure Im completely rid of it now.I had to re install IE. To get rid of it I sent the folder to the recycle bin but it( gator) denied access to being deleted.So I right clicked on that file and deleted it that way. then I looked every where I could think of and deleted all references to gator.Then when I tried to go on line I couldn't get anywhere!!DOH! ,not my home page, not to this site or any others I frequent.I got it working now but be warned. I'm not even sure how I got the program to beguin with................tr

** sorry if this is not the right place to post this**

**edit, thanks mr.B for leaving this post here for the day.**
.........tr

[It_The_Cow]

I think it also has spyware in it. Exactly what does Gator do

[trulyred]

To be honest with you I'm not sure what it does.I did not even know I had the program til it showed up on my task bar. It was like "whats this?" I started investigating it and it wouldn't let me do much,turn it off and properties and thats about it. I got mad when it would not let me delete it.........tr

[Mike K]

I had gator on my old computer. I didn' t know how I got it either! I think i stores your passwords and gives you offers online or something along those lines. I got rid of it a couple months ago but not sure if it is completely gone.

[Mr B]

IF you do not have Gator, DO NOT INSTALL IT!!!! Yes, it IS spyware!

I used to use it, back when I did a lot of dealings thru e-BAY. This little program auto fills in forms for you. Nice proggie in itself, as one click will fill in you name, password, address, phone, e-mail, etc....

Between Gator, and the broadband internet I run, I used to be able to place bid extremely qickly on e-BAY (snipe, if you will... :p ) One auction I won, I was able to put in three bids in the last 29 seconds of the auction!! (bid, outbid, bid, outbid, bid, high bid)

I got rid of it when I found out it was indeed spyware. It is not an easy program to kill. I found out the hard way. Trying to remove it, really messed up my registry, and I actually had to format and reinstall my OS to completely kill it off. This is one tough Gator...:rolleyes:

Don't touch it if you don't have it!! If you do, prepare for a battle trying to slay this beast. :(

**edit**

This really belongs in "Software..." I'm gonna leave it here, and move it a bit later today. This one could use a bit of exposure in GD to warn people who might not go into the "Software" topics...

Mr B

[touser]

yes gator is spyware, and a nasty one at that if you would like you can download ad-aware free here (http://www.lavasoft.de/downloads.html) and it should remove gator for you :) and any other nasty spyware which may be lurking in the depths of your system!

[Mr B]

Originally posted by touser
yes gator is spyware, and a nasty one at that if you would like you can download ad-aware free here (http://www.lavasoft.de/downloads.html) and it should remove gator for you :) and any other nasty spyware which may be lurking in the depths of your system!

Now that's a good freebie! I found this one long after my dealings with Gator, so I don't know if it will, or will not work, but that is a good suggestion.

[m1066ad]

Ad-Aware is great. I try out TONS of freeware, and sometimes apps don't tell ya it contains spyware. (Tip: for most online forms, just make a new .txt file, on yer desktop, with the common info, and then just cut & paste...)

[Silversinksam]

I agree gator is spyware, but if you can find an Old version of Gator to use it will be ok....BUT When you download Gator the first thing you do is go to the ADD/Remove in control panel and DELETE offercompanion.

[blebs99]

Originally posted by touser
yes gator is spyware, and a nasty one at that if you would like you can download ad-aware free here (http://www.lavasoft.de/downloads.html) and it should remove gator for you :) and any other nasty spyware which may be lurking in the depths of your system!
Great call touser! You forgot one thing though.
Get the most recent reference file which is 142 24.11.2001 and install it also. Ad-Aware will get rid of Gator and many others that may be lurking unknown on your computer. :D

[KeyboardCowboy]

Originally posted by It_The_Cow
I think it also has spyware in it. Exactly what does Gator do

i think it is soft/spyware that rembers your passwords for hotmail and stuff like that

[trulyred]

Thanks touser!! that ad-aware is great!! I found 22 files related to gator got rid of them pronto. Those sneaky buggers.....I'm still trying to find out where I picked up that gator program .(damn near like an STD!!)lol mess around one little program and look what you get:D ......tr

[touser]

glad i could help :)

[S_Wilson]

Another good freebie is Zone Alarm. You can get it at http://www.zonelabs.com. Its free and if you install a program which tries to access the internet, zone alarm will ask if you want to allow this. It will allow you to permanently lock out programs if you choose.

[RedDeathDrinker]

Gator comes bundled with a lot of free and shareware proggies these days. If you pick "Normal install" for the program, it'll throw Gator on your HDD faster than a speeding bullet, but in "Advanced install", you can normally get rid of it. And ZoneAlarm works well with stopping these programs as well.

Gator, Comet Cursor, Bonsai Buddy, AOL Browser, all these junk programs can be stopped!

[jazztrumpet216]

Originally posted by trulyred
Thanks touser!! that ad-aware is great!! I found 22 files related to gator got rid of them pronto. Those sneaky buggers.....I'm still trying to find out where I picked up that gator program .(damn near like an STD!!)lol mess around one little program and look what you get:D ......tr

I got that little SOB from downloading LimeWire. I killed it with Ad-aware, worked like a charm.

[Mr B]

Originally posted by S_Wilson
Another good freebie is Zone Alarm. You can get it at http://www.zonelabs.com. Its free and if you install a program which tries to access the internet, zone alarm will ask if you want to allow this. It will allow you to permanently lock out programs if you choose.

I had, oddly enough, both Gator and ZoneAlarm installed at one point in time.... until I found out Gator is indeed spyware..

I still have ZoneAlarm, and AdAware, as well....

I think it's about time to ship this one off to "Other Software"...

*whoosh* :burn: Off it goes......;)

[earthdick]

IMHO, I find Gator very handy, stores all my passwords on my hard drive. But I have ZoneAlarm Pro set to not allow the program to access the Internet. Silversinksam had a great suggestion to immediately remove OfferCompanion. Stops all the nasty pop-ups.

[Diggrr]

Kazaa and Morpheus (a sister of kazaa) will both install these without asking, prompting, or anything. It gave me Bonzai Buddy and Gator. Lucky for me, I had a full ghost backup of c drive, and vaporized them both. I didn't try adaware, but I do run it.

I now have both Kazaa and Morpeus unistalled because they bite anyway, and I'm getting all kinds of junk mail now...up to 25 a day. I don't visit any other sites than what I always have. I think their giving away/selling my info, so I won't let their ad banners make them any money off my machine.

Just my two cents....ciao

[earthdick]

I was wondering what that heck Bonzai Buddy was, it is a cute icon, BTW. Couldn't figure out where it came from or what it does. I zapped it with my phaser right away.

[blebs99]

Originally posted by Diggrr
Kazaa and Morpheus (a sister of kazaa) will both install these without asking, prompting, or anything. It gave me Bonzai Buddy and Gator. Lucky for me, I had a full ghost backup of c drive, and vaporized them both. I didn't try adaware, but I do run it.

I now have both Kazaa and Morpeus unistalled because they bite anyway, and I'm getting all kinds of junk mail now...up to 25 a day. I don't visit any other sites than what I always have. I think their giving away/selling my info, so I won't let their ad banners make them any money off my machine.

Just my two cents....ciao

I'm using Morpheus and there is no detectable spyware in it, however, Kazaa installs webhancer, gator, cydoor, new dot net, and one other piece of work. I found 46 different spyware entries for Kazaa and 0 for Morpheus.;)

[Diggrr]

Morpheus and Kazaa are about the same programs, they even use the same servers. Morpheus, likes to do the installs while you're in the middle of a long file download (when your not watching the screen). MP3's it seems are too short, especially if you've got a broadband connection. It got me while downloading a 150Meg avi. and watching x-files.
If you leave Morpeus running on a long download, I'm sure adaware will find some new spyware. You may even have a new icon or two. I don't know if zone alarm will stop it, as you're using the program to download while it's taking it's liberties. Could be worth a try though. Maybe it switches servers or uses another file to take it's advantage, both something zone alarm should catch.

Merry Christmas all!

[blebs99]

Thanks for the heads up. I'll keep my eyes and programs open. I hope to catch it do something. I did find, at another site, a scripting file that amounts to something like a DoS attack on Morpheus. Gotta check into that a bit further.