What is Remote Aim (Raim)? Does it have to be installed on your computer?

Question

A scan found this on my computer. I'm wondering how it got there and what exactly it is for. Thanks!

Answer 1

There are two red flags just in this program's name

Remote - means that someone else can access your computer. Not a good plan for anyone as the security on most "remote" programs isn't tough enough to stand up to most attacks for long.

AIM - Aol Instant Messenger. Aol is called Aohell for a very good reason. The program never completely removes itself - you have to format your hard drive to completely purge it. I also has abominal customer service, slow connections, the price is quite high for what you get.... The list is a long one.

There is something else called RAIM - "RAIM is the abbreviation for Receiver Autonomous Integrity Monitoring, a technology developed to assess the integrity of Global Positioning System (GPS) signals in a GPS receiver system. It is of special importance in safety-critical GPS applications, such as in aviation or marine navigation." (from wikipedia)

Either way... it has no business being on your computer, especially if you didn't choose to put it on there.

Download some anti-virus and anti-spyware programs to remove it from your computer. Grab a firewall and stop using IE (the blue e) in favour of more up-to-date browsers.

Antivirus (removes viruses that take over your computer, fill up your hard drive, send sensitive info to criminals, and just generally mess up your computer)
AVG - http://free.grisoft.com/doc/5390/lng/us/tpl/v5#avg-free

Anti-spyware (removes programs that spy on you, change your homepage, show you pop-ups, interfere with your computer in many ways, etc.)
Ad-aware -
http://www.lavasoftusa.com/software/adaware/
Spybot Search & Destroy -
http://www.download.com/Spybot-Search-Destroy/3000-8022_4-10401314.html
Spyware Blaster -
http://www.javacoolsoftware.com/spywareblaster.html

Firewall (keeps hackers from wandering into your computer)
Zonealarm -
http://www.zonelabs.com/store/content/company/products/znalm/freeDownload.jsp

Web Browser
Firefox -
http://getfirefox.com/
And no, you don't have to uninstall IE to use other browsers.

Answer 2

You need to remove it. It is spyware that is installed by AOL on computers without the users consent. AOL believes that by going to any AOL site is giving permission.

Compaq now uses the AOL hompage with their computers. When this page first appears this spyware is installed. Using any other AOL sites or programs also installs it and other spyware.