How to Keep your Computer Running
Quickly & Securely

Adware / Spyware Protection

What Is It?

What the difference betweenSpyware and Adware? Spyware is software that tracks your behaviour – it spies on you. Adware is any software that displays advertisements.

Neither are always bad. For instance, free programs (i.e. Eudora mail client) often display advertisements in a section of the window instead of making you pay to use their software. This can be a win-win situation since you get useful software for free and the software’s author can stay in business and improve their software thanks to advertisement revenue. Some add-ons (i.e. the Alexa toolbar) will collect information about what web sites you visit to improve their search results and rank web sites by popularity. Both help you in the end.

However, spyware and adware’s bad reputation is a result of the programs that steal personal information like passwords and credit card details and those that mysteriously cause pornography sites to appear on your screen.

Find Out More

You can find out more about spyware and adware by visiting the following web sites:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spyware
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adware
www.spywareinfo.com

Tools

The most popular, free anti-spyware/adware programs are:
Lavasoft Ad-Aware SE Personal
Spybot Search and Destroy

If you like the free version of Ad-Aware SE, you may want to consider purchasing the Ad-Aware Plus or Ad-Aware Professional versions which provide even more powerful protection.

Microsoft has also decided to get involved by releasing Windows Defender. It has over 25 million users and is also free. You can find out more and download a copy by visiting www.microsoft.com/athome/security/spyware/software/default.mspx.

Other anti-spy/adware programs you may want to consider are:
ZoneAlarm Anti-Spyware
AVG Anti-Spyware
BitDefender
Kaspersky Anti-Virus

As always, you can find even more programs by visiting www.download.com and searching on “spyware”.

What To Do

The rules to protect yourself from malicious spyware and adware are similar to those to protect you from viruses.

Don’t open email attachments from people you don’t know.
Be very careful when running programs from unknown sources. There are programs on the internet with hidden malicious code in them.
Never run executable email attachments from unknown sources. Files with the extensions .exe, .com and .vbs can all contain potentially unsafe code.

Summary

What are the most important things to remember with anti-spyware/adware software? They’re actually the same as the anti-virus guidelines above.

1) Make sure it’s always up to date. (All good anti-spyware/adware software can be configured to automatically update themselves. Otherwise, just make sure you update it each time before scanning your system.)

2) Always have it running. Your anti-spyware/adware software should be running in the background at all times to ensure that your PC has the best chance of spotting & blocking malicious code as soon as your PC is exposed to it.

3) Scan regularly. Most anti-spyware/adware programs will allow you to schedule a system scan for spyware & adware. If you don’t set up an automated task, make sure you perform a manual scan regularly – atleast once a month, preferably more often.)