Anti-Spyware Utilities

Currently, 90% of computers I service are infected by some sort of spyware. Spyware can track your surfing habits and cause pop-up windows that have nothing to do with the sites you are surfing. Spyware can also affect the performance of your computer.

I have had great success with the two programs recommended below. I also recommened downloading and installing both, as no one program can catch everything.

SpyBot Search and Destroy

Spybot - Search & Destroy can detect and remove spyware of different kinds from your computer. Spyware is a relatively new kind of threat that common anti-virus applications do not yet cover. Free, but donations accepted.

AdAware SE

AdAware SE is another program that will detect and remove spyware threats from your computer.

Anti-Virus Programs

In this day and age, running a computer without anti-virus protection is an open invitation to disaster. You might get lucky, but that luck will run out. There are a number of excellent commercial products on the market, but in keeping with the theme on this page, check below for my recommendation.

AVG Anti-virus

AVG Anti-virus is an excellent program. It offers automatic updates and only requires registration to use. If you can't afford one of the commercial programs, now there is no excuse for not having virus protection.

Firewalls

Got Broadband? Then a software firewall is a must! Security experts recommend a software and a hardware firewall. I have used, installed both of these programs and both are very effective.

If you are running WinXP with Service Pack 2, you have a very basic firewall. Microsoft chose to block incoming traffic only. The advantage of a dedicated software firewall is to alert you to unusual programs trying to communicate with the outside world.

Zone Labs ZoneAlarm

The free version offers firewall protection and e-mail scripting protection.

Sygate Personal Firewall

Another good firewall solution.

Web Browser

Until very recently, I was a big proponent of Internet Explorer. But as I did more investigation and read more, I discovered that a majority of problems caused by spyware and internet trash was aimed squarely at Internet Explorer. The recent updates with Windows XP Service Pack 2 made some large improvements, but did not seem to go far enough. Then I discovered Mozilla Firefox. Firefox offers an improved security experience and some nice integrated features, such as tabbed browsing, integrated download manager, as well as a user customizable interface.