another question if im being hacked on my computer??

Question

weird thing happend on my computer sometimes...and that include several closed programs opening up....such as yahoo messenger when the program is on but its closed it sometiems randomly opens up..wihtout me opening it up..also i left my computer on and my limewire was runnin when i came back...and no one has acces to this computer but m.. how and why is this happening? is it a hacking issue?

well i just rid of limewire and have a few ant virus programs set up...now anymore anti virus programs to download? and many peopel have limewire

Answer 1

limewire is as good as other pest programs like weatherbug or hotbar. people keep using them because they are free and they are not interested in their computers safety.

Answer 2

You said the magic word - limewire. Limewire is used by pirates to steal music, movies and software, therefore other criminal types plant files that are infested with trojans, viruses and other nasties. It's like karma - you break the law and get to be the victim of a crime. The odds that you've been hacked and picked up several infections is high, especially since you have the infection vector of limewire plus many symptoms.

You can try downloading anti virus software and anti-spyware (and please, don't pirate it), but if your computer is infected then the malware (depending upon how sophisticated it is) will quite possibly evade detection and disable the anti-virus. The safest thing to do is reformat your hard drive and reinstall everything from scratch, and even that doesn't always work. And then don't install limewire and don't pirate or you risk getting infected again.

--Edit - Yes, many people have limewire. This is part of why computer security experts estimate that 25% or more of all computers on the internet are infected with malware. Simply installing anti-virus software after your computer is infected doesn't help, since you can have multiple infections and any one of them can either disable the anti-virus or evade it. I've seen computers with 20+ different viruses, worms and other assorted malware on a single system. The only real way you have to make sure you're safe is to reformat, to use a tool to over-write the entire drive with zeroes, and reinstall everything from scratch and install an AV product before connecting to the internet.

For info on the subject, try reading some of the following:
http://www.internetworldstats.com/articles/art053.htm
http://nms.csail.mit.edu/papers/index.php?detail=155
http://www.wired.com/news/business/0,1367,61852,00.html
http://www.sans.org/reading_room/whitepapers/policyissues/510.php
http://www.informit.com/guides/content.asp?g=security&seqNum=210&rl=1
http://www.viruslist.com/en/virusesdescribed?chapter=153311928
http://biz.yahoo.com/prnews/070116/sftu131.html?.v=52
http://searchwindowssecurity.techtarget.com/generic/0,295582,sid45_gci1201838,00.html
http://www.mcafee.com/us/local_content/white_papers/threat_center/wp_dmitrygryaznov_vb2005.pdf
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20070125-8707.html

Answer 3

Your system has been hijacked from what you say. Get more than one good anti-spyware/adware program and at least one good anti-virus program. Run all of them! Hope for te best. BTW, uninstall limewire until you get your system clean and don't do any online banking!