Daddy Bob

DADDY BOB'S COMPUTER Q & A

 

July 30, 2006

Q. Every time I turn the computer on a box comes across my screen and it says. The application or DLL C:\Program files\clearsearch\CSLDRupdater.DLL is not a valid windows image. I don't know what they mean and I have done nothing new to the computer and this started appearing about a week ago. HELP!

A. You have an "Adware" program on your computer that it trying to do things that I'm sure you didn't want. Here's a little information on this adware program.

Clearsearch is a keyword-search service program that loads and runs at Windows start-up. When you enter something into the address bar, Clearsearch checks to see whether it includes keywords they have sold to one of their advertisers. If so, it redirects you to that site; if not it forwards you to a Clearsearch affiliate that can silently download and execute arbitrary code from its controlling server, as a self-updating feature.

ClearSearch violates the following criteria: First, changes browser settings without user permission at time of change. Second, Installs or updates without user permission or knowledge at time of installation. Third, silently connects to an unintended location to transmit personal information. Fourth, can't be uninstalled by Windows Add/Remove Programs and no uninstaller is provided with application.

To get rid of this adware, you can download a special file from Symantec HERE. This file will remove this particular adware only, and is only a stop gap cure.

There are three good FREE adware/spyware applications that I recommend that you use. Any one is good, but all three together are se good as it gets and will remove most if not all adware/spyware. These are listed in order of my preference. I actually do use all three on all of my computers. Click on their name to go to the download site. Windows Defender is active all the time and runs in the background. The other two have to be run manually.

1. Microsoft's Windows Defender

2. Ad-Aware by Lavasoft

3. Spybot Search and Destroy.

Q. In order to download my printer update driver, I had to allow the program access through my OneCare firewall.  Now it's checking to automatically update every time I start the computer and I do not want that! How do I find the place to again block it in my firewall?

A. To change the firewall settings, double click the One Care icon in the system tray. When it opens, select "View or Change Settings". Click the Firewall Tab, then the Advanced settings button. Find the entry you want to block, and click the block dot in front of it.

However, I suspect that you should prevent it from updating by disabling it rather than just blocking it with the firewall.

Click Start, then run, and enter msconfig click OK. Click the Startup tab. Things here are pretty cryptic, but you should be able to find something relating to HP update. Uncheck it, and after you restart windows, it should no longer try to update automatically. It will probably also remove the icon from the system tray. (The System tray is located in the lower right of the screen).

Click HERE to view or download this article as a MS Word document.

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