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The Definition of Malware, the Types and the Threat they Pose

June 6, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Malware is an acronym of the phrase “malicious software”. These types of software can infect your computer and damage everything within it. Different types of malicious software exist and these are the major types of malicious software that you want to protect yourself from. A number of other types may exist but these forms of malware are the most likely software to affect anybody who has a computer, whether this computer is connected to the Internet or not.

Malware viruses and worms
These are some of the most dangerous types of software programs which are available. Malware viruses and worms spread very quickly and most times people never get to detect them until it is much too late. When it is much too late a lot of damage will have occurred on your computer. The damage that has occurred will lead to these viruses dropping their malicious code in your computer and spreading them through the use of the internet. No matter what you do manually, these malware viruses and worms will spread themselves very easily. The best sort of protection that can be provided from malware viruses and worms usually comes with antivirus programs.

Trojan horse viruses
Malware that are Trojan horse viruses can do their own sort of damage to your computer. All you simply have to do is download a desktop wallpaper program in order to decorate your computer background. All desktop programs aren’t necessarily malicious but some the whole idea of a Trojan horse is that it is usually bundled together with a harmless looking program. When you install these harmless looking programs on your computer, you end up installing a virus instead. Most of these programs open a door to hackers and other people with malicious intent to install harmful viruses into your system or steal your personal information. Some of these Trojan horses may also operate by taking control of your computer and making your computer do different strange things such as opening and closing your CD-Rom inadvertently.

Protecting your computer from malware
When you want to protect your computer from malware you should also take your time to purchase high-quality antivirus protection and a firewall as well. Both of these things will protect your computer from any sort of malware attack possible. Different malware attacks dependent on the creativity of the creator.
You should also make completely sure that you take the time to update your antivirus software whenever it expires. If you don’t take the time out to do so then the antivirus protection software won’t work properly. Most antivirus software programs usually come with a year or more of free software updates. At the end of this period, the decision to purchase additional protection will be entirely up to you to make. You can simply opt to pay an extra fee in order to get the required protection that your computer needs. You should spare no expense in securing your computer as doing so could save you a whole lot of costs in the very near future.

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The Evil that Spyware Can Do

June 6, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Spyware usually refers to software that is created with the sole purpose of taking partial or complete control of a person’s computer without the permission of the owner of the computer. What spyware does is that it uses the resources in your computer to report certain information to someone else that you do not know. Simply put spyware spies on you and on your computer.

What kind of spying does spyware do?
Spyware monitors what you do on your computer and then forwards your information to someone else by using the Internet. The spying that spyware carries out differs, spyware can keep track of the websites that you frequent and then send this information to someone else. This information usually allows other people to see the sort of information that you’re interested in and they can then send you different adverts in the form of spam. Legitimate companies may also use spyware to advertise to you. In this case such spyware is usually called adware. Adware isn’t as bad as spyware but it may just be as annoying if not even more so.

Other forms of spyware may have a more dangerous way of operating. Some of these dangerous forms of spyware may record every stroke that you make on your computer. These forms of spyware can detect you passwords and collect other information such as your credit card and bank account information. Anything you type on your computer is in the domain of these criminals and they can steal everything from your money to your identity.

Where does spyware come from?
Most forms of spyware usually come from visiting websites that install something on your computer. Some of these websites have different forms of spam on them and they trigger pop-ups which may then come up on your screen. Most of these pop-ups make you click on them because they are usually offering one free promo or the other. When you click on them however, they do something else. This something else is usually the installation of one form of malicious software or the other. Most times you hardly ever notice anything. At other times you see a whole lot of annoying pop-ups or your homepage gets changed to something else.
How can you get rid of spyware on your computer?

A whole number of computer software programs exist which can help you get rid of any spyware on your computer. These computer software programs are usually called anti-spyware programs. Different forms of popular software in this category exist and they are: SpyBlaster, Windows Defender, WebRoot Spy Sweeper and a number of other software programs. Some of these programs may be free but the best of these programs usually come at a price. Some Internet providers also provide you with some of these software programs for free. Regardless of the type on anti-spyware you will need constant updates as newer versions of anti-spyware become available.

How often should you run your anti-spyware program?
Making sure you’re really safe is a personal task and if you want to make sure that you’re absolutely safe, you should run your anti-spyware program every time that you use your computer. These programs are quick and easy to use and they can work in the background wile you focus your efforts on doing something else.

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3 Top Tips To Avoid Spyware And Adware

June 6, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Below are some tips on how you can avoid having spyware installed on your computer without you knowing.

1. Keep Microsoft Windows Updated
Many users are still not quite sure why it is necessary to download software updates on a regular basis.
Security holes in software products are *regularly* discovered, and must be fixed by the software maker, through updates.

Well, in the case of Microsoft windows (your operating system), it’s *vital* that you keep it updated, since most attacks take advantage of security flaws that have been already fixed in the latest updates.
Therefore, it is critical that you download these types of updates in order to combat certain loop holes in their security system.

2. Be Wary Of Dubious Software
I apologise for this rather vague piece of advice, but essentially the way to avoid trouble is simple:
- *Only* install software downloaded from the maker’s site, or from official “mirrors”, and not from other places (especially peer-to-peer networks).

You might then say “well, what if the maker is dodgy?”
My answer would be: “Sometimes, it is almost impossible to tell if a maker is legitimate or not, and that is part of the risk we take when using the Internet.”
If you are in doubt, you always have the option of asking someone techie or ‘in the know’…
Or you can *always* ask me! Send me an email at: mail@spywareremoversolution.com

3. Use An Anti-Spyware Software Product
If you want to be 99.9% safe when using the Internet, the best way is to use an anti-spyware software product which will obliterate all of these problems!
You cannot remove spyware problems with anti-virus software, because the software simply won’t detect them. I know I keep saying this, but this is crucial to your understanding.

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Spying on Your Computer Unbeknown To You

June 6, 2011 By Leave a Comment

We enjoy many conveniences with the internet. We can chat with our friends, shop through our browsers, pay our bills, and manage our bank accounts. But with all this convenience also comes the reality that there are those who want to exploit people through malicious computer acts. Some of the software that makes us susceptible to these crimes is known as adware and spyware.

It is easy to accidentally download adware and spyware onto our computer and not even be aware of it. One of the ways adware and spyware is introduced quietly onto our computers is through the distribution of software known as freeware. Sometimes, we can just visit a site and an adware or freeware program can get installed. Having adware or spyware introduced onto our computers is not to be taken lightly. Adware, spyware, and malware are found all over the internet and our computers are constantly at risk however we either don’t know that we are being infected or all of the sudden we have numerous unsolicited popup ad windows we cannot stop.

Spyware, when it becomes criminal, is also known as malware. Malware is software that can read your computer’s main drive and steal critical passwords, record keystrokes (like when you key in a credit card number), and steal other financial data. Malware is used often to get information that can be later used in an identity theft. Identity theft is a very serious problem today and can be very expensive to combat.
The thing that is so dangerous about the adware and spyware programs is that they can be resident on your computer unbeknown to you. The biggest clue that something has gone awry in your computer and that you are infected with adware and spyware is that you get bombarded with numerous popup windows with advertisements. All of the ads are unsolicited. Many times, you computer will slow to a crawl at the same time that the popup ads appear yet you will not be aware of any new software running. But it is the adware or spyware that is hogging computer processing power by doing who knows what.

An anti-spyware program is the only way you can detect if your computer has adware or spyware on it. Anti-spyware programs are designed to be able to detect any software of this nature and remove it from your computer. The best anti-spyware programs are those that are proactive and guard against the introduction of spyware and adware in the first place. In fact, an anti-spyware program that has both preventative and rescue functions is the one you should choose.

Sometimes these adware and spyware programs get introduced from free anti-spyware programs offered on the internet—very sneaky. This is why it is ever so important to read everything in any end user license agreement (EULA) before you put a new software product on your computer. This is the part we usually just whisk right through when doing a software install by agreeing to proceed. It is right here in the EULA that you may be able to determine that adware or spyware will get installed.

The anti-spyware program should try and remove the adware and spyware from your computer. Sometimes the removal of the spyware can affect programs you did not want to stop running because the spyware and adware was bundled in them.

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Spyware Can Saturate Your Computer

June 6, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Have you ever installed a plug-in to your internet browser only to find out that it renders your browser a nuisance to use? Does your computer system all of the sudden slow down for no obvious reason? It could be because of something known as spyware and many computers are very vulnerable to it.
Not only are many computers vulnerable to spyware but the occurrence of computers infected by spyware is quite common. The InfosecWriters web site (www.infosecwriters.com) reported on a survey conducted by the National Cyber Security Alliance and America Online in 2004 that while over 90% of those questioned had heard about spyware there were only just above 50% who suspected their computers had spyware on them. Then, these computers were scanned and in reality 80% of them were infected with spyware. And many of them did not have only one spyware software product installed but several. Most were averaging more than 90 components installed on their computer with extremes of up to 1,000 spyware components installed on just one computer.

Let’s take a look at what exactly is spyware. While there are several definitions on the internet, spyware can best be summed up as follows:
Spyware is software that alters your computer and changes how your computer behaves thus changing the presentation to the user. Spyware is typically installed on a computer without the knowledge or permission of the user and will hide behind the scenes on the computer while it works on the computer either changing it, collecting information, or both. The intent of spyware is typically not to do harm to your computer but to collect information (like a user’s browsing habits) in order to facilitate a targeted marketing campaign. It sometimes is also designed to alter a web browser in order to advertise specific web sites. Your web browser can also be altered by spyware to display specific results on a search engine query.

Spyware today is designed to run on the Windows desktop operating system and/or its favorite web browser Internet Explorer. Most of what spyware does is take a look at the cookies stored in your web browser from past visits to web sites and reports back your browsing habits to some offsite server. This does not harm your computer per se but it still concerns users because privacy is being violated. There are also spyware applications that are malicious in nature.

The solution to getting spyware off of your PC (or preventing its introduction) is to get a good anti-spyware program. Since there are many different spyware applications and new ones pop up all the time, no spyware program is a panacea for spyware issues. And just because a spyware product is mentioned here, it does not indicate an endorsement of it. But here are a few tools used to detect, prevent, and rid spyware from a computer:

Ad-Aware Professional created by LavaSoft. This company also offers a freeware version of the program with reduced features.

Xoftspy by Pareto Logic

PepiMk Software makes product called “Spybot Search and Destroy”

McAfee Anti-Spyware

Pest Patrol Anti-Spyware

SpywareGuard by Javacool Software (this is freeware)

Keep in mind too that anti-virus programs do not typically handle spyware. A solution needs to specifically state that it will handle spyware. If your computer gets heavily saturated with spyware, an anti-spyware solution may not work and you will have to back up your system, clean your hard drive, and re-load everything.

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Why should you be Concerned About Spyware over Adware?

June 6, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Spyware was introduced as a way for advertisers to get consumer information as it pertains to computer users and be able to target ad campaigns based on the subject’s computer habits. Spyware can also consume all of a computer’s resources such as processor and memory while it uses the internet connection to transmit statistics and other information to another server. Spyware also makes promises to protect your anonymity yet it still makes one suspicious and many times does just the opposite. Adware, while annoying, is not quite as serious and its intent is only for transmitting advertisements in a targeted marketing campaign.

But everyone knows that a personal computer (PC) functions similar to a server and will transmit information to interested third parties given consent or no consent from the user. There is always somewhat of a chance or risk that any kind of information to include information that should be secure can get transferred to an interested third party with or without the user’s permission. In essence many of these advertisers are getting information from you that they would have to pay for otherwise if it were not for spyware.

Like spyware, adware gets installed on a user’s computer without his or her permission. But adware is used mostly to display popup ads and nothing more. Spyware is much more serious in that it affects a computer by slowing it down, throwing out numerous popup ads, and invading the user’s privacy. Plus, some spyware can even become mail servers on your computer and distribute spam email.

Spyware and adware are used many times to help software companies offset the cost of software development. This is why they will allow adware and spyware to be placed in the products they offer as shareware or freeware. The plus for the software companies is that their product can get marketed plus they can enjoy some of the revenue from users clicking on the ads.

Spyware can also present itself as a helpful piece of software when actually it is doing more harm than help at all. Take for instance the BonziBuddy. This was designed and communicated to be a help agent much like Microsoft’s office assistant. It was supposed to help you and assist you in using a computer and the internet. The problem was that it was also collecting personal information about users and transmitting it to its sponsors. BonziBuddy was recently ordered by the Federal Trade Commission to pay $75,000 in fines because it transmitted private information of computer users under the age of 13 (source: Wikipedia, BonziBuddy, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bonzi_Buddy, retrieved 14 November 2007).

Adware typically does not go to the levels that spyware does. It is usually only for displaying those annoying ads. And Spyware is very deceptive because of the following:

Its intent is to only invade and infect computers for commercial gains.

It will very quietly study where you go on the internet and send that collection of information back to the advertising host.

It can create annoying pop-up advertisements.

It can steal your credit card and other identifying numbers by recording the keys you press to enter them when doing online shopping or bill paying.

It can sometimes get around anti-virus software and firewalls.

So indicative of spyware is when your computer begins to slow down for no apparent reason and stay slow. And since anti-virus software does not typically detect spyware, it doesn’t alert the user right away. So the spyware could affect a computer’s productivity for quite some time until the user figures out what is going on and runs anti-spyware software to fix the problem.

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Anonymous Web Surfing – One Way around Spyware

June 6, 2011 By Leave a Comment

The problem with web surfing on the internet is that the process reveals way too much information about you. Advertisers latch on to this information and begin trying to pitch ads targeted at you. This scenario happens even when you don’t have malware on your computer. It is no problem for them to study the IP address of the traffic arriving from your browser. The IP address will tell a website what country you are originating in, your browser, browser history, and type of computer. You can even unknowingly reveal the name of your computer over the internet and they can get your name if your computer supports finger and/or identid. Cookies are also components that can store information about your browsing habits.
So this basically means that when you visit a web site, someone at the other end can get information about who you are. You have no clue who is at the other end getting information about you. They will definitely look at your browsing habits and try to get your real name too.

There are ways to prevent your identity and browsing habits from getting exposed to third parties and that is through a method known as anonymous web surfing. While anonymous web surfing make no guarantees that your privacy is protected, it does make the advertisers out there work a little harder to get your information. Something called the anonymous proxy server is what is designed to protect your privacy. How it works is you browse the internet through the proxy server. The proxy server replaces your IP address with its own and ships the page request to the server of the target website. The end result is that your originating IP address is hidden from the end or target website server.

You can gain access to an anonymous proxy server either by paying for the service or there are many free proxy servers. A couple products on the market today are known as Guardster (www.guardster.com) and ShadowSurf (www.shadowsurf.com). ShadowSurf is basically a free service whereas Guardster has various combinations of free and paid web surfing services. The way ShadowSurf works is you go to their site, type in the URL of the website you wish to go to and that you want to remain anonymous while you visit. These are only two of the anonymous browsing sites. There are others that serve essentially the same purpose. Just go to Google.com and type in the search phrase “anonymous web browsing” and you can see what else is available.

There are other methods to achieve anonymous browsing besides the anonymous browsing sites. You can do use an encrypted connection although this is much more expensive to set up and is technically more complex. You will find various encryption solutions and tips on the internet. You should also delete any cookies after your browsing sessions as these contain identifying information. And lastly, you can set your web browser to not run scripts in web pages such as active content, Javascript, or Java applets. This last method can cause some problems in a few of the websites you visit because those scripts might have been there for a very valid reason and not for the purpose of infecting your computer with spyware.

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Another Form of Spyware – The Keylogger

June 6, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Did you know there was software that can run behind the scenes of your computer and log all of the keystrokes you type? It is known as the keylogger and it quietly just makes a record of all the keys you type and then later an attacker invades your computer and grabs the information. The idea is that the attacker can get this information and then another process can figure out if any information in it is of value such as passwords and credit card numbers. This includes the keylogger with the ability to record an email you created that you thought was confidential but in reality it can be sold to a third party if it contains valuable information.

Keyloggers work by software or there are hardware implementations too. But the software keylogging implementations are by far the easiest to infect a computer with. However their ease of infection also makes them easy to detect. The hardware keylogging implementations are much more covert and technically more complex than the software keyloggers. It would be very hard for a person to detect that there is a keylogger chip in their computer with onboard flash memory storage of the information that can be later retrieved by some external process. Keyloggers also get past the problem of data transmissions that are hidden by encryption as they record at the source—the source being the keys pressed.

Keyloggers continue to get more advanced and with their advancement comes a greater level of difficulty in detecting them. A very serious problem is that they could take months or longer to detect and during that time so much information was exposed. Just imagine the damage that could be done if some process found out all of your passwords, user names, credit card numbers, credit card expiration dates, bank accounts with routing numbers, e-mail contacts, and web browsing history. The exposure of information such as this can put a person at risk of identity theft.

These keyloggers can come in the form of an executable program (.exe) or dynamic link library (.dll) and can be started automatically when the system is booted. Some of the more advanced keyloggers like ProBot Activity Monitor and Perfect Keylogger have the following capabilities:

• The ability to be deployed remotely
• Can export information in text or HTML format
• Can e-mail a log file to a recipient automatically
• Are highly-invisible and practically undetectable
• Can capture keystrokes if a user is not logged on
• Can capture POST data from a web page (useful in capturing passwords)
• Can record the time span when a person used the computer
• Has the feature of capturing the text of applications active in the system

Keyloggers are not just for the purpose of illegal activities. They have many other useful purposes. Parents find them useful for monitoring the places on the internet their children visit. They can legally be used by the FBI to record a suspect’s activity without his or her awareness. This was put to the test with the Nicodemo Scarfo Jr. investigation. He was later indicted for gambling and loan-sharking but a key bit of evidence was when the FBI was able to break the encryption of a file stored on his computer by recording the keystrokes of the encryption password.

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Computers on Alert with Intrusion Detection Systems

June 6, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Integral to the strategy of an enterprise security program is the implementation of an intrusion detection system (IDS). But what exactly is meant by an intrusion detection system? Basically, as a general definition, an intrusion detection system is a system that alerts when the unauthorized misuse and access to a computer system occurs. You can think of them like home security and alarm systems except they are for computers.
Some of the intrusion detection systems will also activate a fallback or corrective procedure in the event a threat is detected. There are many variations of intrusion detection systems however for the most part they fit in one of two main categories. The first category are the intrusion detection systems that look for anomalies in system behavior—anything out of the ordinary when compared with day-to-day use. The second main category is detection of misuse. To detect misuse, the activity must be matched up with behavior that would indicate an attack. As you can imagine, intrusion detection is a very complex science and much work has been put into it.

Another category subordinate to an intrusion detection system is known as NIDS or network intrusion detection system. The network intrusion detection system’s main function is to examine network packet traffic and raise warnings if any activity indicating a possible threat occurring. Network intrusion detection systems can monitor several computers or just focus on a single computer.

Do you know who is accessing your computer?
The biggest mistake people make when the topic of software hackers comes up is that there is an assumption that they are doing their deeds externally to the local network. However the truth is that most security incidents involving company computers comes from the employees. Employees on the inside know more about how to get into the computer system and in many cases they know passwords of other people within the company.

Just how do the attackers get access to a system?
Attackers or intruders into a system will take the easiest route to get in first. The easiest route is of course already having physical access to the enterprise system. It’s hard to stop one who looks to the computer as a valid user of the system because nothing wrong will be initially detected. Even if a person has the lowest level of access to a system it can be a plus because there is always a possibility that higher access can get granted by searching for and detecting any holes in the security profile for a user. And then there are those who access systems remotely who have traditionally been high security risks. Remote access security risk becomes less of an issue as remote intrusion detection methods become more advanced.

Some Intrusion Detection Systems (Open Source)

AIDE. The acronym stands for the Advanced Intrusion Detection Environment. It is the free substitute for another product known as Tripwire. All of the same functionalities are present in Tripwire (which is not free) are found in AIDE plus more have been added. Their website can be found athttp://sourceforge.net/projects/aide.

Snort. This intrusion detection system implements its own language based on a set of rules. You can find their product at www.snort.org.

File System Saint. This is an intrusion detection system that is host-based. Its website can be found at http://sourceforge.net/projects/fss.

More Intrusion Detection Systems (Commercial)
Some of the commercial intrusion detection systems include Tripwire (www.tripwire.com), Touch Technology, Inc’s POLYCENTER Security Intrusion Detector (www.ttinet.com), Internet Security System’s Real Secure Server Sensor (www.iss.net), and eEye Digital Security’s Real Secure Server Sensor (www.iss.net).

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Does it Seem Like Someone is Looking Over Your Shoulder?

June 6, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Of all the threats out there to computer security, spyware has to be the one with the most recent impact and its impact continues to rise. Studies by the National Cyber Security Alliance estimate that spyware can be found on 9 out of 10 personal computers and this is only expected to grow. Spyware is sneaky and can jump through most anti-virus software and ignore firewalls—all in a covert manner. It does its real damage when it starts to work on the target computer slowing it down because of its processing. Spyware is not quite like worms and viruses and it does not have the ability to make copies of itself but it is a serious threat nonetheless.

From where does this spyware originate?
There are three main methods by which spyware are installed on a computer. A common and popular method is to embed a spyware component in a freeware or shareware program that a user downloads to try out. You didn’t really think it was “free” did you? What happens is the freeware or shareware gets downloaded and installed by the user and then the embedded spyware reports information about the user back to its source so as to facilitate in a targeted marketing campaign. The spyware is designed to collect information about the user’s personal computer habits like what websites he or she visits. This information is then sold to third parties. Software known as P2P file-sharing programs are reported to also share spyware programs so you would be wise to scrutinize them.

But how would you know that a shareware or freeware application would also load spyware on your computer? The answer is in the end user license agreement that comes with the shareware or freeware program. But we as users typically never read these licensing agreements and miss the clause warning us that a spyware program will get installed as part of the agreement to use the software for free. Some software publishers give the user the option to allow or forbid the introduction of spyware on their computer. So we are prudent to pay attention to those end user license agreements.

Okay, you say that spyware cannot possibly affect your computer because you have the security features set to forbid it. But did you know that spyware can be designed to deceive you into changing those features and allow its introduction? A common practice among the creators of spyware applications is to present to you a popup dialog box in your web browser asking if you would like to do something such as have your computer scanned for performance issues. The dialog box has two buttons to answer the question: Yes or No. However, no matter if you press Yes or No, the spyware program gets installed. While the latest versions of Internet Explorer are dealing with this issue, you should remember to never press the buttons on these popup dialog buttons. Press only the “X” in the upper-right corner of the window. Closing the window that way will prevent spyware from getting installed.

Spyware applications are also known to be capable of attacking by finding vulnerable areas on a computer via software or the web browser. This can include web pages that have code that will run in the browser if a user navigates there and will “push” the spyware application onto the client computer.

What is Spyware Capable of?
Spyware is capable of implementing many tasks of a malicious nature ranging from being a nuisance to the user to being destructive. Some of the things spyware can do are:
• Install more spyware programs on your system
• Monitor the keystrokes you are making
• Theft of passwords, personal data, credit card numbers, and expiration dates
• Read the cookies stored in your browser session
• Determine the application programs on your computer
• Browse through files on your disk drive
• Alter settings on your default web browser
• Make your computer run sluggish and extremely slow
• Annoy you with popup ad windows
• Generate new generations of spyware making it almost impossible to rid yourself of the spyware programs and cause you to have to restore your system
• Provide no uninstall capability for the spyware program
• Install the spyware program in obscure and hard to find places
• Place new ad links on your web pages where the affiliate settings are not yours but the spyware programmer’s

Some Available Spyware Programs
What follows are a few of the spyware programs seen in the computer world. These are the names of the base spyware programs and many times spyware programmers will alter them with names of their own. So don’t depend on the name for recognition.

CoolWebSearch. This collection of spyware programs can be installed by finding the security holes within Internet Explorer. Traffic and advertisements are then focused and directed towards coolwebsearch.com. Pop-up advertisements come with this spyware. This group of programs also alters the computer’s host file so that the end result will lookup predetermined files on the internet.

180 Solutions. This one tells advertisers about the web sites you like to look at. It can also change the HTTP requests regarding the affiliate advertisement links associated with a web site. Because it can alter the advertisement targets, it gets the earnings from the click and not the proper recipient.

Internet Optimizer. You also will see this one called DyFuCa. It is a program that will direct Internet Explorer to advertisements instead of error pages when there are errors.

HuntBar or Adware.Websearch. Huntbar is also referred to as WinTools. The products are distributed by Traffic Syndicate. ActiveX is responsible for the on-the-fly download from affiliate websites of the products. At times, the downloads are done from advertisements shown from other spyware programs. This spyware product shows us how one spyware program does the installation of other spyware programs. The programs do things like track web browsing, show advertisements, and add toolbars to internet explorer.

What is the best way to prevent spyware?
The first action you can take to keep spyware off of your system is to get a trustworthy commercial anti-spyware program. Some product names you will find available are Ad-Aware by Lavasoft and Windows Anti-spyware. In some cases the anti-spyware software comes packaged with an anti-virus program. Anti-virus programs that include anti-spyware are distributed by companies such as McAfee, Symantec, and Sophos. These programs work by keeping anti-spyware from getting installed and removing it if it gets installed. They should have automatic updates just like anti-virus software.

As was mentioned above, the Internet Explorer web browser is full of security holes and spyware programs take advantage of it. Many users have gone to other web browsers such as Mozilla Firefox. However there are those who are loyal to Internet Explorer and insist on using it no matter what. If you are one of these people, make sure that you keep all of the security patches up to date. Also make sure that you only download from reputable websites.

What is the last resort?
There are times when a computer gets so infected with spyware that not even the anti-spyware tools can clean it. That is when you have to back up your data files and re-install Windows. Hopefully you will never reach this point.

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