Dennis Faas

Have you ever wondered what your loved one is doing online? Infopackets Reader Lisa E. addressed a few of her concerns over the weekend: " Dear Dennis, I have Windows XP. I have several people using this computer and would like to know how to access ... chat files. Everyone has their logon password protected, and my children do a lot of chatting on Yahoo and MSN Messenger. Can you tell me how to find and access these files?" My response: I only use MSN Messenger on my Windows XP system, so I downloaded and installed the latest versions of Yahoo Messenger, ICQ Pro 2003, ICQ Lite, and AOL ... (view more)

Can Digital Steganography be used with good intent? Recall -- Last week, I wrote 2 articles on Digital Steganography (pronounced "Stay-Gan-Aw-Gra-Fee"). By definition, Steganography is simply the art of hiding plain data from sight. In the same ... respect, Digital Steganography is the ability to hide a file inside of another file, called the "carrier file". Both articles focused on a question sent in from Infopackets Reader John B., who proposed the question, "If I downloaded a jpeg image file from the Internet, and it has a virus hidden inside ... [can the virus execute ... (view more)

Infopackets Reader Lorraine M. writes: " Dear Dennis, Way too often while I am online, I receive an error message that says: 'Iexplore has caused an error in BTLINK.DLL. Iexplore will now close.' This seems to happen out of the blue and it is ... extremely annoying. Each time it happens, it takes me off the web site I'm visiting and back to the Windows desktop. How can I stop this from happening? " My response: I went to Google and researched "BTLINK.DLL". From what I understand, the BTLINK.DLL file is part of a Spyware program, called HuntBar. In a nutshell, HuntBar docs ... (view more)

Recall: Last week, Jake Ludington wrote a review on a program called "Move Me", which transfers programs and user data from an old computer to a new computer: Move Me Review After the review was published, I received the following question from ... Infopackets Reader Vernon B.: " Will the 'Move Me' software convert programs from Windows 98 to XP such as Microsoft Works, Word, Roxio, and many other programs? PS: Thank you for the infopackets newsletter each week." I forwarded Vernon's question to Jake, and he responded: " Move Me will transfer applications between any two ... (view more)

Infopackets Reader Jim D. writes: " Dear Dennis, I use Windows 98 and Outlook Express to read my email. A buddy of mine thought he was helping me by 'tweaking' my computer system, but now I cannot open any email attachments! What can I do? PS: How ... may I retrieve a file that has been deleted? " My Response: It sounds like your friend "tweaked" your computer by upgrading you to the latest version of Outlook Express -- version 6. By default, Outlook Express 6 will not allow you to open email attachments on the assumption that the email may contain an malicious attachment ( ... (view more)

Infopackets Reader Gaye B. writes: " Dear Dennis, I'm a newbie on the computer, and I have a big problem with popup advertisements. When I first got my PC, I let a friend use it to surf the web (unsupervised). Since that day, my computer has been ... infested with despicable ads appearing on the screen. What can I do to stop this from happening? " My response: The first thing you should do is tell your friend to mind where he surfs because it has caused you and your PC a lot of trouble! The next thing you should do is download some software that can remove / block popup advertisements ... (view more)

Infopackets Reader Amy O. writes: " Dear Dennis, I recently installed Roxio Easy CD Creator (ECD) 5 Platinum on my PC. Ever since then, my CD Autorun feature would not work. I later decided to uninstall ECD5 in order to restore the Autorun feature, ... but my CD ROM still refuses to Autorun a disc whenever I put it in the drive. Do you have any suggestions to get my Autorun to work? " My response: Autorun won't work unless a feature called Auto Insert Notification and/or AutoPlay is turned on. Auto Insert Notification works by periodically polling a CD ROM drive for the purpose of ... (view more)

Continuing our conversation on Steganography from Tuesday's edition of the Gazette, Infopackets Reader Mike D. exclaims how he downloaded a .WAV sound file that also contained a Trojan: " Hi Dennis, As part of a talk I gave some time ago on IPSec ... [the IP Security Protocol Working Group], I wandered into the area of Steganography. The topic was of particular relevance to me because I had only just discovered (thanks to PestPatrol ) that a Star Trek sound file that I downloaded from the Internet contained a Trojan!" Side note: Digital Steganography is the ability to hide a file inside ... (view more)

Die-hard Infopackets Reader Reverand William A. writes: " Dennis, thanks for such a great news / info publication. I do have a question. I use Outlook Express and would like to know if there is a way to send a message to multiple recipients without ... showing all the names in the TO: field once the message has been delivered. There are times we'd like to send a quick note to many people, but don't want each email address published. Any ideas? Thanks for the help. " My response: What you are referring to is called a Blind Carbon Copy, or BCC. The BCC field allows you to send a message ... (view more)