how to stop zoovy and veruta ads

[matt621]

I have noticed ads on sites that contain items from my shopping cart from other sites.

I have tracked this down to

https://www.zoovy.com/index.html

I'm being targetted to buy items I already viewed, bought, or already decided I do not want.

I don't like showing up on one site with ads for items I bought on another site. Some of these items are just something I was looking for a price and had no intention of buying. But I'm inundated with ads.

I view this as an invasion of my privacy and wonder if Avast can do anything to stop this.

(yes, I'm a paid subscriber to avast)

Thank you.

[Tarq57]

I didn't have a thorough look at that site, but sometimes if a user logs on to some sites (as a member/paid subscriber) advertisements can be the catch. I would have a look at the privacy statement on the site to check that you haven't unintentionally agreed to becoming subscribed to ad bombardments.

What should fix this is to clear your temporary files, temporary internet files, and cookies. Note that clearing the cookies will remove any site preferences you may have set.

[DavidR]

For targeted ads like this there needs to be certain things in play, either you are allowing cookies on that site and also to have allowed third party cookies, this would allow the information from one site to be passed to the other. In your browser you can block third party cookies.

The other area where this could come in is the free toolbar scenario purporting help you do something better/quicker/(insert gimmick of your choice), etc. etc. These in a great many of these toolbars also gather marketing information that can be used for targeted ads.

Whilst this is a privacy issue, it is no less a pain in the a** and there are some things you can do for yourself:
1. Block third party cookies as I mentioned.
2. Don't allow toolbars to be installed unless you know what it is and agree as a lot of free software comes with a toolbar, which is usually opt-out (you need to say you don't want it).
3. Use an ad blocker, firefox 3.6 has add-ons for many security and privacy options; like AdBlock Plus and NoScript, etc.

[matt621]

For targeted ads like this there needs to be certain things in play, either you are allowing cookies on that site and also to have allowed third party cookies, this would allow the information from one site to be passed to the other. In your browser you can block third party cookies.

I have always had third party cookies blocked. However, there has been a few sites I had to put into my "always trusted zone" to get them to function and I think that is part of the problem.

The other area where this could come in is the free toolbar scenario purporting help you do something better/quicker/(insert gimmick of your choice), etc. etc. These in a great many of these toolbars also gather marketing information that can be used for targeted ads.

I don't allow any toolbars. Period.

Whilst this is a privacy issue, it is no less a pain in the a** and there are some things you can do for yourself:
1. Block third party cookies as I mentioned.
2. Don't allow toolbars to be installed unless you know what it is and agree as a lot of free software comes with a toolbar, which is usually opt-out (you need to say you don't want it).
3. Use an ad blocker, firefox 3.6 has add-ons for many security and privacy options; like AdBlock Plus and NoScript, etc.

already doing 1 and 2. and going to remove many sites from the "trusted" zone since they are clearly not to be trusted.

I can look into the ad blocker.

but the main thing I dn't like is how people who use that shopping cart are sharing my buying habits with others w/o my permission or their disclosure.

Mark my work, when it happens to more people, you will hear more about this issue. It's very unsettling.

[DavidR]

I have one site in the always trusted zone of IE security, that of windows update (and I don't really trust that either) nothing else is trusted as that lowers the security level (this just makes life easier for windows updates as I generally manually update). Outside of that I don't have any other trusted sites, however, I don't use IE as my default browser that honour goes to firefox as it has  numerous add-ons that can improve security, privacy and cookies (Cookie Monster)

Very wise, toolbars take up valuable screen space and some have more benefit to the marketeers than the user.