Spyware Removers

A Good Spyware Remover is an Essential Item…

If you are a regular or even occasional internet user, percentages say you’ve come across some form of spyware, what is it? it's an annoying and malicious set of programs affectionately referred to by computer users as ‘spyware’.

The same as ‘adware’, spyware programs follow and track your internet usage, collect your personal information, produce ‘pop-up’ advertisements, and can even hijack your internet browser settings changing your homepage. Spyware generally refers the kinds of adware that are currently installed onto your computer without your knowledge or consent.

A variety of spyware programs will cause your computer to slow down hampering performance, wordt still they may even cause lock-ups and computer crashes. For this reason I highly recommend using a spyware removeron a regular basis to help keep your computer working at it’s optimum performance.

There are a number of spyware removers available today, and the two I most highly recommend are "Pctools" - Spyware Doctor, and Ad-Aware SEproduced by Lavasoft. Both of these programs are available in a basic form free of charge. More advanced forms of the programs are available for a small fee, you can get lavasoft in a free version but what price will you put on your security…

In more recent times, Microsoft realizing this growing threat has jumped into the spyware remover business and has released a free update for Windows XP, Windows 2003, and Windows 2000 called the ‘Windows AntiSpyware Beta’. beta meaning it is still in a testing stage, but is intended to be released as a free product for Window’s users sometime in the near future.

One major benefit of the Microsoft spyware remover is it is often able to detect and halt spyware before it is installed, where as most other spyware removers are normally only able to catch spyware after it is already on your computer.

Be wary when looking for a good spyware remover. There are many advertisements today for spyware removers that are misleading, and there are some phony programs that actually install spyware or adware of their own if you use them! For this reason, its unadvisable to use any spyware remover that you see advertised in a ‘pop-up’ add, or other flashy and obnoxious advertisement, as these are often the spyware programs to be wary of.

Before using a spyware remover, do some research on it online, there are many online communities and forums that discuss which spyware removers are good and which ones are potentially harmful.

No single spyware remover is perfect; you may find better success with some over others. I personally use a paid for version being spyware doctor and the free version on Adaware from Lavasoft.

A good overall strategy is run more than one spyware remover program to increase your chances of keeping spyware at bay. I run both Spyware Doctor and Ad-Aware at least once a week, and install updates for these programs whenever they are available.

Spyware doctor usually releases an update every day that is one the the reasons I decided to use this program. There are new spyware threats created daily and if your spyware remover only updates weekly you are not protected.