Spyware In Limewire
 

From et voila:
"I see you are plain ignorant. I'll lock the thread and leave a nice linky to you."
from this thread:
http://www.gnutellaforums.com/showth...0&pagenumber=2
which was subsequently locked.

Not only is free speech a misnomer in this forum, but it comes in the forms of personal attacks! This really speaks well of LimeWire; stifle any voice of dissent and attack that voice on a personal basis. To think of the hubris involved in such a response makes my skin crawl, as though by sheer force of will.... I may be ignorant, but there is something that can be done about that, whereas for arrogance, this is another matter entirely.

WHAT DOES LIMEWIRE HAVE TO HIDE?

I stand by my contention that Limewire is spyware, based upon a generally accepted definition of that term, regardless of how it makes anyone feel. The emotional blackmail is certainly in keeping with the general demeanour of this forum.

I have presented the qualitative evidence for the contention, and it has not been refuted. As for quantitative evidence, maybe even one of the "true believers" is handy with a packet sniffer as well, and can come prepared to argue their case, but under the current hostile climate, I doubt if that evidence would be presented unedited.

That said, I never inferred that LimeWire was a "bad" program in any manner; I use it and will continue to use it. I said nothing disparaging about the package itself, or the developers; I merely said that it was spyware with the caveats stated above, that is all. There certainly are a lot worse filesharing programmes to be had, and despite the fact that its a memory hog, LimeWire is the most stable application of its kind.

It is the reaction to speaking truth, combined with the misleading claims made about LimeWire that have developed a deep suspicion in me, however. I ask again:

WHAT DOES LIMEWIRE HAVE TO HIDE?

I have presented the qualitative evidence for my contention; now, the onus is most assuredly on LimeWire to prove that it is not spyware. SoftPedia certification not withstanding (which I hitherto have trusted), I think it should be understood just what is being said here, and what is not, without inference, and most assuredly without personal attacks.

LimeWire is spyware until it stops calling home (or gives the user the option of turning it off). Period.

Well one thing about it you are certinally presistient. Even if you don't know your head from a hole in the ground. I see no evidence other than your balloted claims about what you know no proof to back up your so called evidence. Only arguments as to why it can not be presented my guess is you are some kind of a politician or a want be any you can make all the claims and false accusations you want but without the proof it just proves the fool you are.

You can side step the proof issue all you want I guess that is what I would do if I opened my mouth and stuck my foot in it.

Thanks for your viewers

wtf does that mean? calling home and there is no spyware,adware,virus,trojan, etc... if you think there is why post here? no one is going to even notice maybe 1 out of 1000 people will belive you, your just banging your head on a force feild you have no solid evedence why not make a video of you downloading limewire from the offical site doing a scan and prooving it... nough said

The thread was locked because the BS lasted enough. Just know that people here are not paid by LW nor part of their organisation (including me).

Now show your proof once and for all. I'm already tired of you.

if my penetration testing laptop didn't get infected by my friend being funny by loading a rootkit on it, i'd squash your claims, but i don't have floppies to use right now.


i believe theres a possibility people could post a fake limewire with spyware. remember the kazaa spyware infected version and the lite version without it? it could be like that.


post your proof and lets have an adult discussion about it, then i doubt they'll close this thread.



EDIT -- I think I found the "spyware".

Aug 27 17:24:21 Privoxy(01520) Request: www.ge.com/
Aug 27 20:31:09 Privoxy(01636) Request: www.level3.com/
Aug 27 20:31:16 Privoxy(00976) Request: www.weather.com/
Aug 27 20:31:17 Privoxy(00932) Request: www.msnbc.com/
Aug 27 20:31:39 Privoxy(01332) Request: www.sco.com/
Aug 27 20:31:42 Privoxy(01332) Request: www.cisco.com/
Aug 27 20:31:45 Privoxy(01668) Request: www.mapquest.com/
Aug 27 20:32:13 Privoxy(01156) Request: www.overture.com/
Aug 27 20:35:07 Privoxy(01224) Request: www.sony.com/

LimeWire checks to see if you're online or something, its not calling home ;)

hmmm good point banmicrosofttoo

Since a discussion is not possible in a house of worship, the evidence will be posted where it counts: with the Federal Trade Commission. Now close my thread. I'm done here.

Sorry you couldn't prove your point

Ya All Come Back Now Ya Here

Hey man... I've done some test too... but to me it doesn't seem like having spyware... It's real that some spyware scan progs. reported it as a possible threat to my computer (because it's a p2p prog.) but in the end it really doesn't seemed to me like having spyware...
Why is that you don't wanna show us the proof... (are you having some other interests?!?!)

federal trade commission? if the FTC cared about spyware, they would of stopped CoolWebSearch and Gator a long time ago. they're more worried about pedophiles, warez rings, covering up things and terrorists.


limewire doesn't fit in any four of those catagories.

the evidence is overwhelming. some people are extremists and cannot accept the truth. the evidence is that they're connecting to a list of sites to check if you are online. most likely this guy has a paranoid software firewall that makes a random connection seem like world war three.

What an idiot! :rolleyes:

http://www.limewire.org/fisheye/view...onChecker.java

/**
* Array of standard internet hosts to connect to when determining whether
* or not the user has a live Internet connection. These are randomized
* so a minimum number is hit on each check. Note that we only hit one
* random server per test and that we only test the connection if we have
* ample evidence that the users machine is no longer connected, resulting
* in minimal traffic to these sites. NON-FINAL FOR TESTING.
*/

no no no, limewire is a global conspiracy with those websites to innocently "call home" to the mother base.. everyone get your tin foil hats :eek:


now we gotta watch out back about the FTC lurking around the corner..

rkapski, that's what I thought at first too. But since limewire.com and limewire.org aren't in those sites....

In the end, the evidence of Hornet were so good, I cetainly hope he works as a detective, cop or even his country secret agency :rolleyes: I was waiting for packet sniffer logs, firewall logs, limewire open source code... :p

Why Bother?
 

Guys, guys

Why bother argue with Hornet, he's not going to change his mind plus he thinks we have a religious thing for LW.

Remember, you can only have a discussion if both sides are reasonable, you can't if one side is a brick wall.

Life is too short.



UK Bob

yeah uk bob is right lets not fight with nothing will change just let his thread die;)

Bungie was actually a Mac game company and was supposed to get Halo for Mac first. Then Microsft bought Bungie to get Halo as a launch title for the Xbox.

no it was going to be for PS2 :rolleyes: and why do i care i like to mislead lol:) and plus Xbox has much more capiblites ;)
Bungie was bought by Microsoft so techinlly yes im right it is a sub part of M$ yes i should refreaz that it should be they made the first Home computers as UNIX was a server platform

hornet is ... WRONG
 

god a guy on THESE forums posted to have all antisypware and virus **** do u know why... he said he didnt scan his computer for a week or 2 or something and when he scanned he had 6000 (mbe 600 might be a typo dunno) 600 or 6000 spyware and viruses over a week or 2 is really steep.... 2 i run bearshare lite i no cool kid eh but i havent gotten as much **** from limewire.... also when the computer guy cleaned my computer all limewire songs were deleted but normal bearshare songs STAYED ... only problem with bearshare lite is shaw seems to scan my computer while it runs frequently but just the ports nothing big thats the only problem picked up and stopped by sygate .... also for you people infected go get ewido!

Calm Down Geeks Limewire Isnt A Spyware Program Its Not Spyware It Self Althoug What Ever U Download Can Have Spyware If Down Load Music U Have A 20% Chance U'll Get It If U Download Any Video U Have 65% Chance Of Getting It And If U Download Any Cracked Program U Have A 90% Chance-- So Just Think Next Time U Download Something

I don't think these guys care too much any more...this thread is from 2005:blink:

Not only that I think your odds are a bit off from my experience. I have DL several thousand files in my time. Spyware maybe 4 , Viruses 1 so your percentages are way off.

That "shift" key must be pretty worn down by now with all those capitals. Forums should read like a book, not like a front cover.
Anyway, I download music, then check it by extension:
.MP3 => [OK]
.WMA => OK, but not very good.
.OGG => [OK]
.COM => NO WAY! Virus here!
etc...
Videos - I perform a similar check. (PS. Linux doesn't catch Windows viruses. You can run limewire for linux)
Cracked program - If you use windows, run "fc /b XXXX YYYY" on the files. If they are totally different (or of different size), trash it. Also, you could just crack it with any good debugger. But let's speak no more on this subject.

And next time, use find/replace on your post:
Geeks --> Intellectuals.
I'm sure most people would not like to be called geeks, let alone by someone who can't spell "you"!

OK! Rant over.

I just have a question, not an accusation. I think Limewire is very cool, but I have noticed one behavior that make me suspicious if not a little paranoid.

I only have a DSL connection on an older PC with Trend Micro Firewall and Internet scanning, Spybot and Adaware. These programs do a great job of thwarting the evil hackers out there interested in my lowly PC. And what these don't catch I can get with HijackThis and CyberScrub.

However, in Limewire I am connecting in Leaf mode which is supposed to mean I am sheiled by Ultrapeers and should not get direct searches to my machine. I do share my files and am not a leecher, but I have these persistent searches being done to my machine which cannot be cleared with the Clear Inactive button. These are the "whatisnewxoxo" and "kinky" and some freaky ACSII character searches that I can't even recreate. Limewire allows you to doubleclick on the search but it just brings up some phony Browse Host window that doesn't even allow access to the IP address. Plus displays all those other phony search results that display on nearly every seach, such as "whatisnewxoxo ringtones" supposedly an html file of 0.2 KB and "whatisnewxoxo wet and wild" a zip file of 2,010 KB, my personal favorite "[Full] whatisnewxoxo with bonus". You know what the bonus is.

My point is, there is no way to stop this obvious constant intrusion. I have no idea what these bots are searching for, but I know I can't turn them off. There is a line in the limewire.props file that teases me that I can set FILTER_WHATS_NEW_ADULT=true, but after I save it I find that it has absolutely no effect on the incoming barrage and when I restart Limewire I find that the limewire.props line FILTER_WHATS_NEW_ADULT=true is no longer true, it's false. Something sticky is going on somewhere.

I am only an amatuer developer, so by the time I sift through millions of lines of "Open Source Code" you'll have released the fifth version from now! :)

Look I know I may be an idiot compared to you Limeware gods (notice the little "g" in gods as there is only one God), but this kind of stuff really bothers me. That and the fact that when I set my Downloads directory to a different one than the Shared directory, it was like Limewire got mad at me and would save the files in the Shared directory anyway until I moved them. I found out this could be stopped by changing the limewire.props file again ... LAST_FILECHOOSER_DIR= ha, ha, ha!

I also fould it odd that my system cleaning software killed all my Shared files too ... :( But I am not a total loser, I'm just gonna make a backup of my stuff an share what I want. That is unless the evil "whatisupxoxo" somehow knows every inch of my lowly and insignificant system.

BTW, love Limewire or Limeware or whatever. :Smilywais:

It's funny noone has responded to my post. I wonder, have I struck a nerve or are you all just ignoring me in hopes my very valid "proof" will remain unnoticed...

:welcomeani:

My apologies to the LW community. It seems that the "whatisnexoxo" worms are already well know and seem to be totally separate from LW itself. Although I do still think it should be easier to block these invaders, one frienldly guru named Birdy showed me this link:

http://www.gnutellaforums.com/open-d...-limewire.html

Very, very helpful. But like all viruses, it needs to be updates regularly. So, many thanks, at least I have a weapon to fight with now.

:rolleyes_2: