@ #3 - You appear very stressed. Trust me, if 'Law Enforcement' needs to look at your "business" on your computer, I can find it quite easily, regardless of this program. This is designed for prying eyes in the private sector.

I use Firefox for my web browser. If you have a newer version it has a private mode which doesn't log your browsing info. That being said your ISP or even some work networks can track your surfing regardless of what you do in your computer.

#6
it sounds like the full messadge might have been
"Are you sure you want to EXIT the Duplicate File Cleaner wizard before it finisheS the scanning of your selected hard drives?”

by answering NO ... you would have allowed it to finish in this case and it bombed ???

would aboring the program with a bad error been a better solution???

when a program acts strang i try to asses the isue and kill it. then restore to a point BEFORE downloading the program if there seems to be a problem.

tweak ui seems to do the same as this program.

CCleaner (Free) removes trackable temporary files.

Clear all Event Viewer logs manually via Control Panel / Admin Tools.

For paranoia or files needing to be hidden, TrueCrypt (Free!) can create hidden folders or partitions!

Not quite sure hence why today's GOTD might be useful!

@19 "A Plea for help from a Newbie"

I would suggest that you take your request for help to the GOTD forums. The first thing that you should do when you arrive in the forums is to register yourself. Anonymity is not a big deal in the forms because if you're there very long most people will get to know your style and will recognize your posts.

After you register state your case and ask for help in the format that you feel would be most useful for you and for others in similar circumstances.
If you go through the simple steps that I have mentioned you can be assured that several people will be glad to respond to your plea and will provide you with the information that you're looking for.

You will find that the GOTD forums exist in a friendly atmosphere and that they operate in a completely different manner than what you see on the GOTD download (this page). In the forums, the pace is slower, comments are friendly and helpful, and expertise is more widely available. While you're in the fourms if you behave yourself you will be treated well. It's unlikely that your questions will be labeled "stupid".

#3: "... Nothing wrong with the knowledge that we are all accountable to someone else in what we do either online or offline!"

NOT disagreeing, but the other side of the coin is those people who have gone to jail etc, & were then later found innocent because hackers used malware to store illegal stuff on their system. IN a perfect world law enforcement & the justice & legal systems are perfect too -- alas we don't live in a perfect world, & none of those three are perfect either. In much less extreme cases, it doesn't take that much to impersonate someone & get them in trouble.

* * *

#11: "... 98% of home computers use dynamic IP adresses. Applications cannot hide or disguise your IP unless you have a Static IP address..."

An easy way to verify your IP, see if it changes or has changed etc is [whatismyipaddress.com]. BTW, to change IP with an always-on connection Google/Bing with your ISP info to be 100% sure, but usually you can unplug the modem outbound connection overnight, & when you plug in, in the AM you'll have a new one [be aware of course this will also disconnect your phone line if you have/use voip]. FWIW, Proxies like the TOR network don't have any way of telling how you connected in the 1st place, since they only *see* your ISP's connection to the Net, so they could care less how your PC/laptop hooked up.

* * *


#19: "... I down loaded, got the serial and regesteration #’s, started the program, but the # ‘s were never asked for, therefore the TRIAL software get loaded..."

From the GOTD readme.txt: "... run the application and register the software throug "Help" --> "Register" using the registration name and activation key provided."

19/Rob:
Keeping any documentation up to date and reflect last-minute fixes & enhancements is historically lowest on the developers' list, so you will often find minor discrepancies in what a 'readme.txt' or other documentation tells you versus what the actual program expects you to do.

In today's offering, the readme.txt (inside the zip file) simply tells you to install the software, then run the application and click Help -> Register.
What it fails to tell you is that, at the end of the installation, you will see a pop-up window with a heading of 'Successfully activated' listing the same Registration number and key just like in the readme.txt.
'Successfully activated' would lead most reasonable people to think that you are all set but not so.

Despite the wording, AntiTracks has not been activated and you must now follow the instructions in readme.txt and first click Help, then Register - here you can copy/paste the aforementioned
registration number and key and complete the activation/registration for real.
Also notice that you have to close and start AntiTracks again before it will correctly show the updated registration status (under Help -> About).

Many will ignore requests for help though none of us were born knowing everything - learn and give back when you can.

#2: "If it doesn’t conceal the IP, it’s not really protecting my privacy at the most basic internet level."

There are a few comments of this sort, so in case it helps...
When you connect to the web you're assigned an IP address -- this is used to send you whatever you requested, e.g. the web page for the URL in your browser's address bar. If you didn't have that IP address it's just a one way connection. Your IP address also works like Caller ID, since it's unique to the modem/Internet connection when it's connected -- always on connections normally have a static IP, whereas dial-up connections have a new IP every time they connect. To hide your true IP address it's necessary to go through 1 or more other connections to the net, because the last IP is the one that's visible, but your connection *might* still be recorded in their logs. Alternatively you can connect anonymously to some other network [often unsecured wireless access or by hacking], & use that network's IP, where any logs can't point to you because they never knew your identity in the 1st place.

Going through one or more connections is called using a proxy, & it slows things down -- there are pay for access proxy servers offering [alleged] better performance because of less crowding, sometimes bundled with privacy software. There are also loads of free proxies -- they're pretty simple to set up -- and there's the TOR network, which is a worldwide chain of free proxy servers focused on secure privacy... the easiest way to use it is with the free TOR browser pack, which is also portable. Be aware that doing things like downloading a large file, using some plug-ins etc can still compromise your privacy while using something like TOR. And using a proxy doesn't do anything about your connection, or anything traveling over it... unless your initial connection is secured, it can be monitored [spied on], which is why or where you'll hear about secure VPNs, which in a nutshell protect everything from your connection to the 1st server you connect to [think of signing into your account at Amazon & then using Amazon's servers as proxies, though of course you can't do that].

That all said, consider *what-if* your IP address *is* known? That's not always a big deal, though it can be enough for someone to do a bit of mischief if they really wanted to. Decide if your relative anonymity is worth the price in time, effort, sometimes cash, & most always performance, & proceed accordingly.

The developer(s) of Anti Tracks 7 make lots of claims, but for what it's designed to do, assuming it works [it wouldn't in 7's XP Mode VM] it doesn't look too bad. It's greatest weakness may be the strategy behind most all *cleaning* apps -- cleaning up afterward vs. never leaving anything behind that needs cleaned up. Otherwise it takes a somewhat different approach than the popular ccleaner... rather than scan everything & pick/choose what you want to get rid of, Anti Tracks has you select what you want to erase 1st, & after that it's simply a matter of having it get rid of what you pre-selected. There's advantages to either approach, with ccleaner perhaps being more flexible, but also more time consuming if/when you already know what you want to make go away on a regular basis.

Anti Tracks also has Obsolete Files, Duplicate Files, & Broken Shortcut Cleaners -- the Obsolete Files Cleaner looks for temporary files/logs, while the other 2 are self explanatory... all give you options to select listed files for deletion, erase or send to the Recycle Bin, plus an option to zip deleted files 1st [since it didn't work properly in the VM I have no idea where the zip files are stored, & I didn't see any mention of this in the included help file]. There's a Disk Wiper to over-write the free space on your drive, but I didn't see anything about including the extra space in individual disk clusters [your hdd's divided into many small clusters, & as files fill up however many they need, the last cluster used is partially empty -- if you're paranoid enough you'll worry about any old data from deleted files that may be readable in that cluster free space]. Under File Security, Anti Tracks can lock/unlock files/folders, encrypting (not hiding) them, appending an .ate extension to each file -- you use the app's Unlock window to decrypt them. Hiding & Unhiding files/folders means using the built-in steganography to bury them in an image or audio file. The Windows Startup Mgr seems to delete registry entries in the Run keys, not relocate them as Autoruns [SysInternals] does. And there's a separate Browser section for erasing your choice of records/caches in the 4 main browsers, optionally on closing.

Bearing in mind it didn't work properly in the VM, so there may be things missed... Anti Tacks takes up just short of 5MB with 134 files, 5 folders in the program's folder. No changes were made to Windows other than the Start Menu & the Registry -- installation adds an uninstall key, a couple of GiantMatrix keys, + 1 key under HKCR\CLSID... all-in-all not too bad, though some will probably add in comparison that as a portable app, ccleaner doesn't add any.

There are loads of alternative apps & approaches or strategies depending on how much time/effort you want to invest & how paranoid you are [please note that I'm not saying it's a good or bad thing to be paranoid -- sometimes I'm sure it's justified]. Personally I favor not leaving tracks when practical, but to be safest that means using a VM [Virtual Machine], & erasing rather than simply overwriting the virtual disk file that holds it. Likewise you can use a portable version of whatever app including browsers, but files are very often written to your hard drive & then deleted, not erased. Some people use an OS on external media that can be encrypted, or just encrypt the hard drive on their PC/laptop -- leaving tracks is irrelevant if no one can read them, but having encrypted disks/files etc. may be incriminating in & of itself. Dell KACE has a free, secure, virtualized browser using Firefox. Wondershare had their Time Freeze app on GOTD recently -- that *could possibly* [AFAIK no one's thoroughly checked it] be a secure way to go if you made a copy of the cache file it uses when you 1st install the app, then erased the old one after using it, making a copy of the copy for it to use next time. If you want to see what tracks you're leaving now, Nirsoft has a few free apps that can be pretty revealing [Warning -- your AV software might not like them at all]. You can also find info online [Google/Bing] re: the registry's UserAssist keys, which are often overlooked & might provide too much info.

Tried to install twice on Win 7 64 bit OS. Both times Error access violation. Uninstalled.

#16

SOFTPEDIA REVIEW refers to the full version of this program which includes the "IP Concealer" feature that is missing in today's giveaway (see GAOTD's note above)!!!


And I think this is the main (or unique)reason for which the user rating of this GAOTD is currently very LOW (73% THUMBS DOWN), as everybody knows that the best way to protect our privacy on the net is to surf anonymously.

So make a comparison, as you did, between SOFTPEDIA REVIEW and this GAOTD doesn't make sense for me, since it's like comparing APPLES with PEARS ...LOL!!

I went through a 'repair' process with a Microsoft tech support person once and they had be perform some log file retrievals for them from the command level. EVERYTHING is available to people who know how to get it. The complete history of your system.

I seriously doubt that any of these programs would remove the logs I was instructed to receive and send to tech support.

East Tech Eraser 2009 is BETTER and FREE!!

Some other programs to consider:

Glary Utilities - free
CCleaner - free
Firefox (private browsing mode) - free
Sandboxie - 5 second screen nagware

While Sandboxie is an anti-malware tool for (mostly) browsers, it also makes browser "applications tracks" vanish.

Finally i register this soft.This is a version without IP concelear.But is free forever,so thank.

The Good
- Somewhat easy to use and fairly straightforward

The Bad
- Can't resize window
- Seems to be a memory hog sort of I think maybe

For more and a real good review go to www.IdontKnowSquatAboutSoftware.com

Thank U Mucho Moreo

#18 - Rob - Some of the GOTD programs don't need the registration process or automatically do it for us. That said, it is not always the same process for each of the giveaways.

Sometimes you might have to search for where to put the serial number or where to register it. Sometimes it pops up after you open the program, sometimes after you close and reopen it. Sometimes it does not pop open and you have to search for it. The registration for GOTD programs MUST take place on the day it is given away otherwise it won't work so if you have programs from yesterday in 'trial mode' you can pretty much forget registering them. At least I've yet to see one be allowed to register the day after unless they extend it for extenuating circumstances.

For those programs without the window opening automatically you can check up near the top, under the last word (usually 'help'), and the drop-down menu might have a line saying 'register' or something similar. Clicking on the 'about' will usually let you know if it is registered or not.

Good luck with that and hopefully some others will take a few moments to add to or correct what I've written.

To #18: Rob, after starting the programme, try to find in its menu a button or an instruction called "Register" or "Help" or "About". Under such a word one can usually find and open the "register" window. In that window you will be asked to introduce the serial and registration numbers and ... voila, if successful, you won't have the trial version anymore.

I didn't download the programme from today, so I don't really know the exact steps you should take, but it usually works this way. Wish you good luck! (I've been a newbie myself, so I know how it's like, but don't worry, you'll get used to this computer stuff. :))

@18: Look around under the menu choices. There should be some way to register the program there.

In most programs, you can click "Help" and select "register" from the dropdown. Sometimes that's not the case, but the idea's generally the same.

To check activation, click Help > About and see if it says it's registered. If it doesn't, just make sure it doesn't say "trial version" or "demo mode", or something similar. It might be a good idea to check that screen before and after registration to see if anything changes, but keep in mind that there's some odd pieces of software that don't show registration status on that screen.

Just try to use some common sense. It might help if you thought about menu choices as "caveman speak". Imagine being able to talk to your computer.. But only at a few words at a time and with short sentences. "I want to save this file." becomes "File, save.". "I need some help, I want to register!" becomes "Help. Register.", and so on.

software features cost $ 35 but not good or lose other software, this is not my choice. I think free software is better :)

@#9 Don't forget to read the user reviews on that site as well. I like the folks at Cnet too but it's important to see how the customer is treated too.

I take customer reviews with a grain of salt because it could always be a competitor trying to hurt his/her competition but they should be looked at and considered.

#18 Rob
Most downloads are different for each program.
Usually after the activation you go to Help, Register, and enter the code provided. Then it is no longer a trial version.

Bubba

For this program is necessary to have configurate Outloock from s.o or from Microsoft Office to register for free.Why not gmail?.I have gmail and my outloock is not configurated so is impossible to register.I don't want to search and learn how to configurate Outloock ,so i will renounce.

Could someone please discuss and rate the steganography functions?

The program is a great help towards the max. achievable security.

Improvement proposals:
* no option to choose the installation drive,
* first blue screen was already there, windows might not like the software :),
* the windows startup manager does not detect all startups (e.g. compared to system explorer),
* the obsolete file cleaner should have the option " file(s) to exclude / skip " in addtion to "remove file without deletion" to use the disk cleaner more efficinetly, the extentions filter and the option " folders to skip " in settings cannot be used to exclude specific scanned files that are not obsolete,
* I suppose the price is for non-techie market segment.

Thanks & Cheers.

ccCleaner is what I've been using and it held up to it's name so far for me. Using this program would be like jumping out of a plane without a parachute. Thanks anyways GAOTD

could not install to any drive but C:

A Plea for help from a Newbie,

Because I was not born Computer Literate, I am having considerable difficulty many times downloading the GOTD's software. I can usually “activate” it, but sometimes I have a difficult time ”Registering” it. Things in the instructions that are very simple and elementary for you folks are somewhat forign to us Newbies.

If someone would be kind enough to write up “Instructions for Newbies” on as many days as possible and post them on this website, I, and I'm sure, many others would be very, very grateful and appreciative.

Like today. I down loaded, got the serial and regesteration #'s, started the program, but the # 's were never asked for, therefore the TRIAL software get loaded (not what I wanted).

Thank you for any help given.

Rob Montierth - NIN (newbie in need)

Price is not justified by functionality

It installed itself into my standard programs folder on D:

CNET rates it 5 stars out of 5 (Excellent)http://download.cnet.com/Anti-Tracks/3000-2144_4-10277553.html

* Excerpt from CNET editors' review: "By all means, Anti Tracks is one of the current best bets for anyone who needs a capable way to protect a PC's privacy." (Note: It was reviewed by the CNET Staff on November 07, 2008)

* Average user rating: 3.5 stars out of 5 (79 votes)

Softpedia.com rates it 4 stars out of 5 (Very Good) http://www.softpedia.com/reviews/windows/Anti-Tracks-Review-144119.shtml

Note: The version reviewed was Anti Tracks 7.3.1
Note: There are a lot of screenshots of the Anti Tracks program on this page.

SOFTPEDIA'S The Good, The Bad and The Truth (Hey,they stole this format from Ashraf! *hehe*):

* The GoodAnti Tracks comes with a well-designed interface that is easy to handle by novices and expert users alike. It is a suite with extended functionality that, besides its area of expertise in eliminating web browsing and computer usage traces, also covers obsolete files deletion, free space sanitizing, restricting access to information, finding duplicates, secure erasing and broken shortcuts cleaner. It is dependable with almost all the tasks that are laid out and moves at a reasonable pace (took about 15 minutes to go through 14GB of data in search of duplicates).

* The BadIt seems this version is not yet ready for the upcoming Office 2010 suite, as it did not affect the current beta we faced it against at all. IP Concealer does not work in all the countries.It would be nice to have some protection over the settings of other web browsers, not just Internet Explorer. On the same note, automatic detection of installed browsers would ease users’ configuration efforts a lot.

* The TruthAnti Tracks performed very well during our testing proving stability and reliability. It comes with minor flaws, which can be easily overlooked. The price remains the biggest drawback, as $34.95 is a lot of money, even for Anti Tracks’ capabilities.
Snapfiles.com rates it 4 stars out of 5 (Very Good)http://www.snapfiles.com/get/antitracks.html

Don't want to start anything, but in the interest of information, #10 is incorrect (though I can think of stronger terms for it). If you have cable or dsl, you have an IP address that doesn't often change as is -- for all practical purposes -- static. It CAN change (mine has, once in 3 years) put not often. That said, "IP concealers" *as a class* don't work very well but are common and freely available (Tor) so this isn't a big deal.

As for this offering, I've tried it in the past and found it (fairly) buggy; with random hangs and frequent explorer crashes after it was installed. For me, ccleaner was a much better solution then though I might try this now to see if things have changed (from the sound of it, they haven't).

Just to amend my earlier post. I have no question that this app will hide/disguise a Static IP address. My point is that IP Hiders don't work with Dynamic IP addresses.

to shegeek: I think it means your browsers homepage. On IE, if you click the house on the command bar,the one that many sites encourage you to "make us your homepage".the one that sometimes gets reset without your permission.

No option to install on a drive other than the root drive ( C: ).

98% of home computers use dynamic IP adresses. Applications cannot hide or disguise your IP unless you have a Static IP address. So people that are miffed that this app won't hide your IP need not be upset as it would not have helped anyway. For home users w/ Dynamic IP addresses (which is most of us) the ony way to hide your IP from a site is to use an 'anonymous proxy' which means you go to one anonymous proxy site and enter the address you want to go to, then your IP address is shown as the anonymous proxy site's IP address.

There are thousands of anonymous proxys out there. That's how kids beat their schools firewalls and access sites they shouldn't. So many anonymous proxys come and go all the time it's impossible for the schools to keep their black list up to date of all the anonymous proxy sites. Just put 'anonymous proxy' in your favorite search engine and you will find tons of them.

PS - To get a static IP address, you need special permission from your ISP which is like getting a business phone number.

No IP concealer? That's one of the most useful features, as it hides your computer while on the internet. A shame they couldn't include it. From their website: "Protect your browser's home page from being tampered with by malicious websites!" I'd like to know how it accomplishes that, as I have three websites. Does it only protect the home page? That would be pretty useless if all the other webpages aren't protected. However, cnet, who I trust (http://download.cnet.com/Anti-Tracks/3000-2144_4-10277553.html), gave it five stars. So I'll probably try it!

...i think I changed my mind. It hangs randomly when clicking on the sidebar menu. It seems pretty nice though, if it didn't hang randomly. I'm sure that will be fixed in future versions though. I will try again then.

Incredibly confusing interface, makes me wonder if any HCI work was done on this software at all. No default selections, i needed to go through a stack of configuration settings to set it up. Doesn't appear to detect any of the programs installed on my system, these all need to be selected manually. Steer clear and go with a decent tool like ccleaner, nothing to recommend about this software.

Windows keeps so many activity logs that no tool can really conceal the user's activity. The most these tools do is only conceal some of the more-hyped ones, so better not to trust them too much.

This software offers very less features at the price of 34.95$. There are many free soft-wares which gives better optimization and security and this software should change its user interface.

And i even can't find out what this error message says while testing the program:
"Are you sure you want to the Duplicate File Cleaner wizard before it finished the scanning of your selected hard drives?"

and i select "No" to the error and try to close the program then it gives error :
"Error:Access violation at 0*7C8024E0(tried to write to 0*03180E94), program terminated."

I think none wants to pay for this program which gives error that you can't understand.

Hey that sounds cool. I know CCleaner takes care of a lot of junk-cleaning but I like the idea of having several tools in the same program.

Installed OK in WinXP, will try later with Win7x64.

Impressive set of plugins! I like it! Will use it :)

Blue screened my computer after install.

> Limitation: this version does not include IP Concealer feature.

If it doesn't conceal the IP, it's not really protecting my privacy at the most basic internet level.

What it seems to offer is protection from snoops in your home or office, which is of course another form of privacy. But not one I need, or can be bothered to perform these baroque arabesques to achieve.

Thanks but no thanks.

Pretty average, and $35 is way too expensive. Glary Utilities, free, pretty does everything this tool can do, and more. CCleaner also has better history erasing tools.

The one good word I have to put in for it is the plugin section, which allows you to clear the history of programs besides your web browser and Windows--it is possible through this to clear Adobe Illustrator's history, if you have it installed.

The lack of a registry clean or defrag, and the fact many tools simply link to the appropriate Windows function, make this a disappointment.

Use Glary Utilities and CCleaner, both free, instead.