The Windows XP Security Series Part 4 - Spyware

Spyware Protection is an absolute must. Spyware can sit on your machine and cause all kinds of havoc and you are left, for the most part, unaware. I'm gonna show you how to keep this stuff from getting on your computer in the first place and, even if it does get on, how to get it off.

First, use SpywareBlaster to fend off the unwanted. SpywareBlaster acts as a shield to keep your computer from from nasties. It runs silently in the background, so you should remind yourself to update it about once a week or so.

Second, you should install Windows Defender. This Microsoft made product scans your computer in real-time to keep spyware at bay. It also has a manual scan in case there was any that leaked through its defenses.

The third program you should get is Ad-Aware SE Personal. Ad-Aware is an excellent scan-only device (the pay version has real-time protection) that will find whatever might have gotten through the first two defenses. You should scan your computer with the latter two programs at least once a week or run Ad-Aware if your computer is acting sluggish or weird.

If there happens to be a bug that got through those three programs, it will probably get picked up by AOL AVS. It also scans for spyware along with viruses.
If you happen to find any spyware with these programs, then delete the spyware through whatever program found them and immediately restart your computer. This keeps the spyware from rewriting themselves if they have that ability.

Now, I bet you're wondering, “Why all the different programs? You only use one antivirus program, why 3 different spyware apps?” Well, there's some controversy as to what spyware actually is and there are so many different ways they can work and reside to your system that all spyware programs have different definitions as to what they are and how they remove them. “Why do you need all this when my Security Suite detects spyware?” I personally don't use Security Suites because A.) They cost money and B.) They don't protect as well. How? There's an unwritten rule about all-in-one software: The software does two things great and one thing not so well. You could have an excellent firewall and antivirus, but it doesn't do so well with spyware or vice versa. An audiophile doesn't buy an all-in-one system, he gets different components from differing manufacturers. That's why his stereo system sounds wonderful and yours just sound “okay”. The same usually can be applied to software, especially security software.

If you just don't feel safe enough, there's two final things you should try. One of those is to get Process Scanner by Uniblue. Uniblue's website is one of the best databases online for Windows processes. Process Scanner scans your computer locally to see if any of the processes that your computer can run are security threats (whether they're running or not). This app helped me track down a WORM hidden on my machine.

The second thing you should do is get Firefox with the following two Add-ons: CookieSafe and NoScript. CookieSafe I've talked about before but NoScript is awesome because it won't run JavaScript on each site you visit unless you say it can. Javascript happens to be a hacker's favorite way of distributing spyware and worse to your PC.

Well, there you have it. After following this guide, you shouldn't have a problem with spyware anymore.