Adware, Spyware, Malware – Protection vs. the drain on your computers resources

The three words are normally used interchangeably. They all refer to intruders placed on your computer as you surf the web. Adware is usually a cookie placed in your C:\Documents and Settings\Username\Cookies folder when you visit a website. It tracks your browsing habits and arranges ads to pop-up on your screen when you open certain sites. Sometimes they appear on your screen when you aren’t browsing, and sometimes they arrange emails to be sent you advertising certain products. The products may be financial, pharmaceutical, sexual, or other.

Sometimes the intrusions are controls in your Windows/System32 directory, or entries into your Windows Registry. They can be hard to remove properly, as you will see below. Some make expensive phone calls if you’re on a dialup modem, usually to porn sites.

Others, usually in the class called Malware, can corrupt your registry, erase your data, change your home page, and perform other nefarious deeds.

Norton AntiVirus catches a few of these intruders, but not enough to relieve you of the need to buy a dedicated adware remover. Properly removing intruders can be complicated, cumbersome and time-consuming. Best to catch them before they get on your computer.

Dozens of programs purport to scan your computer, find the intruders, and delete them. Obviously some are better than others. Some update their ‘reference files’ more often than others. Reference files are databases of which controls, files, cookies and registry entries to look for.

Furthermore, trying to delete an intruder yourself can cause problems. Thus it is crucial to buy a product that has comprehensive, frequently updated reference files.

By far the favorite is Adaware Pro. You can buy it almost everywhere. For information on Adaware, link to the site of its manufacturer: http://www.lavasoftusa.com/

Here’s one endorsement:

I recently had some problems with adware, spyware and malware. Call them whatever you want, they are all a royal pain in the neck to deal with. I checked into Ad-Aware and looked at what it does and decided toat I would spend the money for their Pro version (a shade under $40 US). It’s one of the best purchases I have made.

I like the fact that the pro version is pro-active in that it gives real-time protection against the above named evils as well as stopping pop-ups. It also gave me one additional level of protection, one I had not even thought about when I was purchasing it. When I had a really annoying adware incident, one that had popups happening while working on projects and not browsing the web. I went to their support forums and posted what was happening. It took only several hours and I was advised as to what to do so they could figure out how to solve the problem. I posted what they asked for and within a day I had an answer that worked and solved the problem. That also helped others in that the particular offender was quickly included in their updates.

This help was entirely from other users! Talk about knights in shining armor coming to the rescue! I endorse this product and say that it is well worth the money it costs, and that really is not much at all considering what it does for you.

Make sure you buy Adaware Professional. There’s a free version, but it doesn’t stop intruders before they get into your computer.

Now, let’s take a look at Adaware Pro. When you open the application the initial screen is:

Be sure to click ‘Check for updates now’ before you click the Start button. You want to scan your computer with the latest reference file.
Once you run the scan, Ad-aware will tell you how many intruders it has found:

Click next:

In order to act against an intruder, you have to click the checkbox to the left of each item. There is one problem. If the vendor is a dialer, deleting it can cause problems. It probably won’t, but that can’t be guaranteed. That is why it’s important not to allow them on in the first place. I’ll discuss that later.
If you want to know the details of an intruder, right-click the item:

Click Item detail�

How do we prevent these items from intruding on our computers in the first place? Ad-aware Pro comes with a companion program called Ad-watch. You should always run the program as soon as you boot your computer.

Then press the minimize button. Its icon will appear in your task pane.

That’s enough for now. I encourage you to buy these two programs this week. Then next week we can discuss further issues, such as what course of action to take if an intruder is a dialer. You sure don’t want expensive calls made to porn sites off your computer..
Dennis Turner