Beware of Keyloggers

Computer Care: Watch for keyloggers that can steal your password

	By Arthur Glazerglazer.tech@gmail.com

	POSTED: December 1, 2012 1:00 a.m.

	My wife logged on to her eBay account early one morning this week to discover she had sold two Wii units to someone in South Carolina. Normally this would have been a good thing, except for the fact the she sells clothes online, not electronics. She had been hacked. Somehow, without her knowledge (or permission), her computer had a keylogger installed on it. This allows whichever low-life who installed it to see what she types — passwords, bank account and credit card numbers included. So without even a cup of coffee in her yet, my wife was on the phone to eBay customer service, Paypal and then our bank. It was not the way she wanted to start the day, and that was only the beginning. We had to discover what, if anything, else had been sold from her account, what money had changed hands and what else had been compromised. It was to be a long morning. My wife and I have both bought and sold on eBay through PayPal, since it showed up on the Internet almost two decades ago. Although many people tell us they are skeptical about purchasing from an online auction site, we have experienced very little trouble in the 17 years we have been dealing with it. They usually side with the buyer, rather than the seller. Unless you have lots of documentation and a good case to present, you’re in for a battle to get your money back being an online vendor. As a merchant some years ago, I was taken for a couple of hundred dollars by a scammer who claimed my shipment was never received. I shipped without asking for delivery confirmation at the time. Not only did I lose the merchandise, I was forced to refund the money. In the days following, I determined this person had scammed a dozen other eBayers similarly. Unfortunately, PayPal saw no pattern so I never got my money (or merchandise) back. Live and learn. I believe in karma and figure soon enough this reprobate either got caught or was a victim of a scam himself. One could only hope. But I digress. Keylogging, or keystroke logging, as it is also known, is a form of malware, or more specifically, spyware. There are various incarnations of this type if infection, each one recording what you type on your keyboard, each just as difficult to detect and remove as the next. Your keystrokes are recorded as a log or text file and emailed back to the hacker. At this point he has your passwords, banking information and anything else he may want to steal from you. The thing to do if you get hacked, especially with a keylogger, is to first change your passwords. This is a prime example of why one shouldn’t use the same password on multiple (or all) accounts. If you do, then go change all of your passwords, which isn’t a bad idea anyway if you know a keylogger was installed on your system. Choose a difficult one with at least eight characters, including numbers and symbols. Avoid the obvious like addresses, birth dates and pets. Next call your bank and look at your withdrawal history. Even have it flag your account to notify you of suspicious activity. Also call PayPal if you deal with online auctions and have an account with it. Unfortunately, you won’t get much help from your ISP, which will say it’s all on you and to call your bank. Last and certainly not least, clean your computer. You are infected. Run whatever security package you have on your system. If you don’t have one, now is the time to get one. As I’ve stated before, most antivirus programs just look for viruses. This is not a virus and your dedicated AV utility may not look for nor find keyloggers. Run full scans and allow the malware utility to remove or quarantine any infections as it sees fit. Reboot your computer when all is done to be sure the infections are removed. Do not ignore this. It will not go away on its own. It will cause you grief you do not want to experience. Keyloggers will take hold of your computer, then your money and your identity. They make pop-ups seem like a walk in the park. Even if nothing happens immediately, don’t fall into a trap of false security. They have your personal information and are just waiting to use it. The faster you react, the better. Keylogging can be beneficial and legal in certain applications and can also come as hardware attached to a computer. But most often it is installed clandestinely to steal financial information. As unfortunate as this was for my wife, it did give me something to write about for this week’s column and warn you of the pitfalls of keyloggers. Don’t let it happen to you. It’s imperative that you take action immediately, should a vicious infection like a keylogger attack your system all of a sudden one morning. Arthur Glazer is a freelance writer and computer technician in Gainesville. His column appears biweekly on the Business page and on gainesvilletimes.com.