this post was submitted on 10 Apr 2024
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[–] [email protected] 65 points 8 months ago (11 children)

Kaspersky is just one piece of software to avoid. Others include:

  • Telegram
  • Avast AV
  • Anything from 360 Safe / Qihoo 360
  • Opera browser ... now owned by above
  • Zoom
  • FileZilla / UTorrent / other PUA that bundles adware and acts essentially as a trojan
[–] [email protected] 32 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Add in:

  • TikTok
  • Facebook, Instagram, Whatsapp, and Threads
  • Reddit :)

For antivirus, Microsoft's built-in one is fine. Ideally use an OS that has better security and lower default permissions like popular Linux distros (at the very least, it's a smaller target than Windows). I haven't checked recently, but using Malware Bytes for occasional runs (not as active protection though) was good and is probably still good.

But in general, use FOSS, at the very least they'll probably not pull a Reddit and screw over their users.

[–] [email protected] 13 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Seriously. Windows Defender is an excellent piece of software, and its all you need. Paying for anything else is kinda foolish.

If you're on windows, you dont need anything else except maybe to install malware bytes once a month, run the scan, and uninstall it.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 8 months ago (1 children)

This is Lemmy. Chances of people here not using Windows is relatively high.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 8 months ago (4 children)

You know what they say about assuming things.

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[–] [email protected] 23 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (3 children)

This just feels like a random hit list; how did you come up with it?

Why zoom? It's based out of San Francisco.

I also object to the Telegram inclusion. Unless you want to include Discord, and various other server side encrypted communication apps. The founders may be Russians by birth but they have Ukrainian roots, are no longer Russian citizens, had their first company stolen from them by the Kremlin, etc. Also I always like to note, Einstein was a German by birth but he was no Nazi.

What's the FileZilla connection? Tim Kosse (which as far as I can tell it's still the primary author) is a German.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Honestly, Zoom just has a hilariously high frequency of vulnerabilities being discovered.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 8 months ago

I mean... That's fair, I don't recommend zoom, but those reasons have nothing to do with Russia and everything to do with a company that was willing to lie that they had E2EE and didn't.

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[–] [email protected] 12 points 8 months ago (4 children)

Telegram is better than WhatsApp. At least it has a decent Linux client, and all clients are open source. WhatsApp has neither.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 8 months ago

Unless you're constantly using secret chats all your data is stored in plain text... This is actually worse than WhatsApp

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[–] [email protected] 11 points 8 months ago (5 children)

Ah fuck, what's the alternative to FileZilla?! I've been using that for like 17 years.

[–] [email protected] 21 points 8 months ago (4 children)

So just to illustrate, I went to the normal FileZilla download page and downloaded the Win64 package. Then I submitted it to VirusTotal.

https://filezilla-project.org/download.php?platform=win64#close

https://www.virustotal.com/gui/file/dbde8a4bd71bb1fbc0511cdb657dfeffdaedc513aa425f856043532a7cba6fce

[–] [email protected] 12 points 8 months ago

If you click other versions, there are installers without the adware.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 8 months ago

Those dumbasses have been doing this for years. I don't know if it has viruses and such in it but it has had the bundled stuff for a while now.

I wish it didn't since it's a great program.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 8 months ago

filezilla has an opencandy installer

[–] [email protected] 2 points 8 months ago

As someone who has used FileZilla for years, I am shook and I appreciate you pasting the link

[–] [email protected] 13 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Dolphin on KDE/Linux and WinSCP on Windows

[–] [email protected] 7 points 8 months ago (1 children)

I think whatever GNOME calls their file browser supports FTP as well.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (1 children)

It surely does, but i'm not sure if you can switch to side-by-side view

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[–] [email protected] 7 points 8 months ago
[–] [email protected] 2 points 8 months ago
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[–] [email protected] 10 points 8 months ago (1 children)

I'd say avoid AVG too then since it's basically Avast.

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[–] [email protected] 6 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (7 children)

Out of curiosity, why Telegram? (Im out of the loop on this one)

As for uTorrent, I’ve got version 2.2.1 and have never allowed it to update in the last decade or however long it’s been. I think that was the last version that didn’t allow any ads or otherwise and was simply a solid p2p client at the time.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 8 months ago

Because it's less (because of history stored on server and use of OTR being problematic) secure than ICQ in year 2003, prone to phishing and, yes, made by people I wouldn't trust.

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[–] [email protected] 6 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Does Escape from Tarkov make the list?

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[–] [email protected] 59 points 8 months ago (2 children)

Country in a trade war / cold war with another country decides to block imports of some product from said other country, citing fears of the product being poisoned. It's barely news.

[–] [email protected] 34 points 8 months ago (2 children)

It’s news worthy enough for a technology sublemmy, I’d think.

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[–] [email protected] 3 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (2 children)

It's news. That's all that matters.

Also this is actually a pretty unique and interesting scenario. You ever seen a digital embargo of software from a single country imposed on citizens? Not to mention the dignity and rights violations on both sides...

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[–] [email protected] 37 points 8 months ago

Why would anybody in their right mind use Kasper by now.

[–] [email protected] 32 points 8 months ago (8 children)

Why would anyone trust, want to use, and yet alone pay for Russian antivirus software

[–] [email protected] 9 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (1 children)

I'm not sure how that's relevant. People should be free to use whatever they want. I'm not interested in Russian software, but that doesn't mean banning it is okay. The same goes for Chinese software like TikTok (not touching that), Iranian software, or North Korean software, if that's even a thing. I don't care if literal Nazis made the software, people should be free to use what they want.

The only areas the government should get involved are:

  • government owned devices
  • public advisories
  • prosecution of crimes where the software is involved

The software I choose to use is not the government's business. If I violate a law, charge me with a crime, but don't preemptively ban stuff.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 8 months ago (27 children)

What if said software is being used to manipulate national interests from a civilian level and its owned by an adverserial nation?

[–] [email protected] 7 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Can't wait for the EU to ban Facebook :(

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[–] [email protected] 28 points 8 months ago

Only pure all-American spyware on my machine. 🇺🇲🇺🇲🇺🇲🦅

[–] [email protected] 11 points 8 months ago (2 children)

You’d think the fact that Kaspersky is useless would be enough to keep people from using it.

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[–] [email protected] 7 points 8 months ago

We gonna have to worry about 7zip?

[–] [email protected] 6 points 8 months ago

Will this affect websites, too? Cs.rin.ru is a good resource for a certain type of thing.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 8 months ago (1 children)

FBI on its way to arrest me because I used MPC-BE to play dolby digital content without a license for the ac3 codec like 10 years ago lol

[–] [email protected] 2 points 8 months ago

They can pry MPC-BE from my warm cheeze curl stained hands! I've been using it to play 4K BluRays on an HTPC, and to decode all these new proprietary surround sound codecs so I don't need to buy a new expensive ass AVR.

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