I have a software package called SpyBot that seeks out adware, cookies,
spyware and that sort of stuff. I ran SpyBot a couple days ago and it picked
up a cookie from =Avenue A, Inc.= I dutifully commanded it to disappear,
then it occurred to me that I had not been on the internet to visit any
websites that morning. Now, yesterday, before I went on-ine, I ran SpyBot
and got a 'clean' report. Right after I skimmed through and read a few
posts, I went off-line and immediately ran SpyBot.
Well, up popped Avenue A, Inc., again. Same thing this morning, same
sequence, same cookie.
I has to be coming from here, since the other two newsgroups I subscribe
to were empty on both days and in both cases, I did not connect to any
website.

To my knowledge, cookies do not come from newsgroups, however depending
on the newsreader you use, you could get cookies from that program. For
example, if you use google, you would be using a web browser to access
the groups, and that browser is what is accepting the cookie requests
(which probably come from advertising sites attached to the web site).

If you are connected to the internet in =any= form, it is possible for
rogue programs to communicate with the outside world. You may have such
a program residing undetected on your machine.

Google
"Avenue A, Inc." cookie
and the first two links will give you some info. It comes from a Vonage
ad and generates popunders.

You can opt-out of it by getting an "opt out" cookie which is available
on their site. (atlasdmt.com) It's basically a cookie that says "keep
out". It is possible that the opt-out cookie will be detected by your
spy program as an intrusion because it doesn't know the difference - if
this is true, ignore the warning.

Jose
--
Math is a game. The object of the game is to figure out the rules.
for Email, make the obvious change in the address.