Google has joined with Sun Microsystems and Lenovo to fund a new anti-spyware project, which was launched last week. The new site, StopBadware.org is designed to act like a “Neighborhood Watch” for the Internet. Its About Us page says that StopBadware.org “will seek to provide reliable, objective information about downloadable applications in order to help consumers to make better choices about what they download on to their computers”. The site aims “to become a central clearinghouse for research on badware and the bad actors who spread it, and to become a focal point for developing collaborative, community-minded approaches to stopping badware”.
StopBadWare.org will rely on users to report problems. Visitors can already submit badware horror stories or fill in a special form to report technical details on the suspected parasite. The site also provides draft unsolicited software guidelines and general badware definition.
Although, today, it is not absolutely clear whether or not a new project will be useful for users, it is gratifying to know that leading Internet, software and hardware companies become concerned about spyware and adware problems.
