• heavy@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
    0·
    9 months ago

    For those that don’t know, theres a tab in Windows task manager called Startup that let’s you modify what apps get started when you log in.

    You can also look at the services.msc tool and check all your startup services.

  • helpImTrappedOnline@lemmy.world
    0·
    9 months ago

    For those that have this issue,

    Disclaimer:

    misuse can seriously fuck up windows. Disabling things that shouldnt be, is bad. Many of the services are required by other aplications to run. Do not disable any Microsoft services.

    If you can not read or just want to uncheck everything you see, this is not for you:

    Sysinternals Autoruns is like the task manager “start up” section on 5 doeses of steroids. https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/downloads/autoruns

    • Ziglin@lemmy.world
      0·
      9 months ago

      Please disable all Microsoft services. Your PC and privacy will thank you… (Unless you decide to use something somehow even worse)

      • helpImTrappedOnline@lemmy.world
        0·
        9 months ago

        There’s definiaty some you can and should be disable, but I’d use O&O for that. Unless you actually know what each service does, its best to leave them alone.

        • CptEnder@lemmy.world
          0·
          9 months ago

          Ya know any services that can be disabled in general and how to safely turn them off and back on if something doesn’t work? I hate how Windows Services eats up so much of my really powerful computer.

    • Twitches@lemm.ee
      0·
      9 months ago

      It is but you don’t want to recommend it to anybody who doesn’t know what they’re doing because they can seriously break their computer lol

      • empireOfLove2@lemmy.dbzer0.com
        1·
        9 months ago

        Even Windows doesn’t really even need a 3rd party anti-virus anymore. The built in windows defender has gotten so good as to really be all you need for active protection unless you’re insanely stupid and keep bypassing it. Use Malwarebytes for deep file scans once in a blue moon, and you’re golden.

          • empireOfLove2@lemmy.dbzer0.com
            0·
            9 months ago

            Do you have windows 8, 10 or 11?

            Defender has been on in the background this entire time and you don’t even know it. It is on by default and incredibly hard to truly disable.

        • drathvedro@lemm.ee
          0·
          9 months ago

          windows defender has gotten so good

          It’s only good at detecting windows&office activation tools. I have never ever seen it detect anything other than those.

          • cm0002@lemmy.world
            0·
            9 months ago

            Hate to tell you this, but Linux nor MacOS are safe without AV

            It’s just Windows, by far, has the largest share of active systems so everyone targets it. Both MacOS and Linux have their own share of bonafide viruses though

            • thefartographer@lemm.ee
              0·
              9 months ago

              Hate to tell you this, but nuh-uh! My Linux server is just going through a phase where it likes to collect porn ads and share credit card info with Russia!

          • Perfide@reddthat.com
            0·
            9 months ago

            It’s still not actually needed for experienced users though, I’ve haven’t had a virus in over 10 years, so it hasn’t had anything to catch.

            Boy oh boy did it freak the fuck out about the exe I compiled myself from a python script I wrote myself, though. Had to specifically exclude it from defender to stop it from quarantining it every time it ran. All it does is check to see if a link on a website has been updated since last look…

            • pivot_root@lemmy.world
              0·
              9 months ago

              This is the main takeaway that people seem to be missing: follow good computer hygiene, and you’ll be fine.

              Keep your shit updated, and don’t download/run things you don’t trust. Keep an unintrusive anti-virus running in the background as a backup just in case there’s a supply chain attack, but don’t rely on it to make your decisions on whether to open a file or not.

              • shneancy@lemmy.world
                0·
                9 months ago

                golden rules of PC hygine:

                don’t use an admin account as your main account

                if you haven’t directly triggered it yourself, the answer to that pop-up is “no”

      • SchmidtGenetics@lemmy.world
        0·
        9 months ago

        Hasn’t a bunch of malware spyware and other malicious shit been found all over decades old Linux stuff the last couple months?

        • MotoAsh@lemmy.world
          0·
          9 months ago

          IIRC, that was more about auditing the “supply chain” of apps and Linux. Some college kids were purposefully trying to get malware on the mainline Linux repo and obviously got themselves banned from touching Linux.

          Otherwise it’s just been normal security vulnerability type stuff? There was also a long-existing bug found in a very common library recently, but that’s very solidly in the normal flow of security research, the bug just happened to be sitting there a while.

          Linux of course is a target and has malware. It’d be completely stupid of attackers to ignore Linux because the vast majority of servers run it. It’s a readily available target with lots of goodies on those servers.

          • thefartographer@lemm.ee
            0·
            9 months ago

            I don’t think it was just some college kids, I could have sworn their professor was specifically getting his students to perform as bad actors to support some super-biased research papers he was trying to publish.

            • Pika@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
              0·
              9 months ago

              Yeah but this wasn’t recent, this one was like 4 or 5 years ago unless it happened again. If I remember correctly it got the entire University’s email address banned from contributing to the kernel

              • thefartographer@lemm.ee
                0·
                9 months ago

                Oh yeah, I get what you’re saying. Yeah, two completely separate instances. Although, from the sound of it, there are a surprising number of people who seem to think that sabotaging Linux and hacking Linux are the same thing. I mean, I guess a pirate can sail on any ship, right?

        • TWeaK@lemm.eeEnglish
          0·
          9 months ago

          Yeah but antivirus software doesn’t pick up zero days, which is what you should really be concerned about.

          I had some Chinese radios a few years ago, they were proper radios that you could program for all sorts of stuff. I had the software on a USB stick, then plugged it in about 5 years later - pinged up with all sorts of viruses that weren’t detected previously.

          • SchmidtGenetics@lemmy.world
            0·
            9 months ago

            They don’t pick up anything that they don’t know about, so once the zero day is known the antivirus/malware can find and remove it I thought.

            • pivot_root@lemmy.world
              0·
              9 months ago

              They don’t catch zero-day exploits, as those are vulnerabilities in programs that were discovered to be used in the wild. They will eventually catch the malware dropped through those exploits, though.

        • dangblingus@lemmy.dbzer0.com
          0·
          9 months ago

          Don’t download shady exes, run ublock origin, force https, use a vpn, and reroute your DNS lookups. It’s super easy to not download viruses and malware.

          • pivot_root@lemmy.world
            0·
            9 months ago

            I agreed with you up to the “use a vpn” part. That’s just wasting money and adding extra steps for the sake of paranoia.

            If you’re using SSL/TLS and not blindly bypassing invalid certificate warnings, you’re not going to have your device or accounts compromised by the hacker boogeyman.

              • psud@lemmy.world
                0·
                9 months ago

                They hide your browsing from your ISP (and probably your government)

                They hide your origin and substitute another for web sites.

                I’d say a VPN is only useful to people engaging in crime, or things that look like crime and those buying services that are priced differently around the world

                That provide no protection against things you might click on

                • Chriswild@lemmy.world
                  0·
                  9 months ago

                  There are far more uses for a VPN. For instance if I want to access my NAS while outside my home.

              • pivot_root@lemmy.world
                0·
                9 months ago

                You have a good reason to use a VPN: bypassing region restrictions (or piracy). The people subscribed to a VPN service for security reasons usually don’t*.

                * Excluding those living under a censorship heavy government.

        • pivot_root@lemmy.world
          0·
          9 months ago

          Nobody is immune to it, but it’s a lot less common for sketchy websites to provide malware downloads specifically targeting Linux PCs. The market share is nonexistent, the average user is more technically inclined, and the desktop environment ecosystem is full of variations that make it difficult to develop a one-size-fits-all solution.

          It simply isn’t worth it for most malware creators to focus on Linux desktops. Servers are a different story, but that malware is planted by humans or automated intrustion tools.

          That being said, none of this precludes stupidity. If somebody downloads Oppenheimer-1080p.mkv.exe and opens it in WINE, you can bet your ass that the ransomware malware will do its job just fine.

    • Random Dent@lemmy.mlEnglish
      0·
      9 months ago

      I almost felt the same way about MalwareBytes. I know it’s actually useful but it hassled me so much about upgrading to premium that it was more annoying than having actual malware.

    • otacon239@feddit.de
      0·
      9 months ago

      CCleaner also hasn’t been necessary since at least Windows 7. I remember working in a PC repair shop when people would just arbitrarily run CCleaner on its most aggressive settings whether it was needed or not and it would always break more things than it fixed.

      • GregorGizeh@lemmy.zip
        0·
        9 months ago

        I mostly used it to clear out various caches and cookies, and invalid or no longer necessary file type extensions, folders and so on.

        Was very handy for that, and usually freed up a surprising amount of disk space (back when a few gigs more or less made a huge difference)

    • Risk@feddit.uk
      0·
      9 months ago

      What do you mean at this point?! It’s been malware for almost two decades!

      • ZMonster@lemmy.world
        0·
        9 months ago

        I think you missed the reference. They weren’t referring to children as a lack of familiarity with OS functions, they were referring to children as an ignorance of programs you should ever or never install. If you have mcfee on your computer, TODAY, you should just set your computer out on the curb and never touch an electronic device again.

        • AlphaOmega@lemmy.world
          0·
          9 months ago

          Until I read the original comment, I didn’t know that was the symbol for McAfee.

          Since windows 7, with defender, there’s not even a use for a third party anti virus for the majority of users.

          This must have come pre installed with the system. Nobody installs McAfee of their own volition, right?

          • Sanctus@lemmy.worldEnglish
            0·
            9 months ago

            A lot of systems come with McAfee on them. Especially all the shit you can buy on Amazon from the “vendor stores”.

      • I Cast Fist@programming.dev
        0·
        9 months ago

        And then, when the program next updates, it silently re-enables its “startup with the computer” option, because fuck you. Of course, it updates every day, just to ensure you never “accidentally” disable it’s automatic startup!

        • Klear@lemmy.world
          0·
          9 months ago

          You don’t want to remove GoG completely, but I’ll be damned if I let it just start on every reboot.

      • viking@infosec.pub
        0·
        9 months ago

        Acrobat reader is free and does this.

        Also, when I was a kid I sure as hell was running some pirated Photoshop and other stuff.

  • Foni@lemm.ee
    0·
    9 months ago

    Who the hell uses the Spotify app?? If you use it from the browser, ublock eliminates advertising perfectly. Why would I want to use the app where I can’t block it?

    • Flying_Parpaing@lemmy.world
      0·
      9 months ago

      If you’re talking about “ea background service”, you can disable it by deactivating background downloads in the settings.