Ears On

If you thought your PC security problems began and ended with those Sony rootkit CDs, think again. The watchdog organization stopbadware.org has issued a warning about the file-sharing service Kazaa: "We find that Kazaa is badware because it misleadingly advertises itself as spywarefree, does not completely remove all components during the uninstall process, interferes with computer use, and makes undisclosed modifications to other software." The group issued similar warnings about MediaPipe, a movie download program; Waterfalls 3, a screen saver; and even SpyAxe, which ironically enough bills itself as an anti-spyware program. Stopbadware.org is led by heavy hitters from the Harvard Law School and the Oxford Internet Institute with support from Google, Lenovo, and Sun Microsystems.