What happens if You Click On "Get Zwinky"?

[ralph124c]

This thing keeps popping up on my screen. It is supposed to be a search engine; anyway (for those of you who have done so):
-what does it do?
-can you pick up a virus from it?
-do you really spend time dressing the Zwinky up? Sounds boring to me
How do they make money off this?

[ZipperJJ]

It installs some spyware which redirects un-found urls to their search results, and then they get money when you click on links from their results.

From Wikipedia:

Zwinky adds the MyWeb Searchbar toolbar to the following applications: Internet Explorer, Mozilla Firefox, Microsoft Outlook, Outlook Express, AOL 9.0 Email and Browser, Becky!, IncrediMail, MSN Dial-up Service, AOL Instant Messenger, Google Talk, ICQ, MSN Messenger, Yahoo! Messenger, and Windows Live Messenger.[1]

Once Zwinky is installed, the MyWeb Searchbar runs on startup. When users attempt to visit nonexistent pages, the software redirects them to search.mywebsearch.com. MyWeb Searchbar has been included on lists of known spyware.[2] A review from McAfee SiteAdvisor of the Zwinky website states, “In our tests, this site promoted downloads that some people consider adware, spyware or other potentially unwanted programs.” There are also many user review complaints about the spyware that the Zwinky website supports.[3]

[BigT]

Huh. My ISP does that with their site without any spyware at all. All you need is a DNS server…

[Koxinga]

Let me ask my Bonzi Buddy and see what he says.

[Perciful]

You can make a cartoon avatar of yourself to use on boards.