Spybot

[kleinboet]

Can anyone tell me about SPYBOT SEARCH AND DESTROY? I appear to have it on the computer - never installed and I don't know what it does.

HELP PLEASE.

[Newt]

It's one of the two best apps on the market today for removing spyware/malware from your PC - at least IMO. The other I like is Ad-aware and I use both.

 

Spyware/malware isn't seen by anti virus software since it really isn't a virus. But it can and does send information about your PC out to places on the internet without letting you know or asking permission.

 

That would be bad enough for me to want it gone but the stuff is often poorly written and will cause all sorts of operational problems.

 

Spybot will run, complile a list of bad stuff, and give you choices about what to do with each of them. It also has a single-click option to 'immunize' your PC so that known bad items never are allowed on the PC. Around 530 items in this list as of now.

 

Since many of the spyware thingies put registry entries on the PC, you can't safely deal with them by just deleting the things even if you could spot all of them.

 

Give it a try. Be sure to run the update first so you have the latest version and the latest list of bad stuff it will search for.

 

[ 05. January 2004, 10:51 PM: Message edited by: Newt ]

[Peter Sharpe]

Get the latest update and run it in advanced mode. A fantastic piece of software.

[kleinboet]

Wow!!! I cannot believe my computer had so many 'aliens' on board. Thanks guys!!!

[Newt]

Do yourself a favor and also get Ad-aware and the latest updates.

 

I like to run both.

 

Spybot has some great additional features like the immunize thing, the ability to clean various history files,the ability to lock your home page against changes you didn't want, and a few more.

 

Ad-aware seems to find a few more critters and is updated more frequently but is purely a spyware detector/remover.