What is Spyware?
By
Tommy Carlile
Alliance Link
Spyware is everywhere you turn nowadays. It used to be when your computer was acting
up you automatically assumed that your computer had become vulnerable and that
you had a virus but now more likely it is that your computer has been infected
with Spyware.
So what exactly is Spyware anyways? Spyware essentially is software that is
installed on your computer without your knowledge. This software normally runs whenever your
computer is turned on, so basically it is constantly running no matter what you
are doing.
It can
track what you do online and send what it finds back to databases that trace
customer statistics. Perhaps you spend a
lot of time surfing on eBay looking at sports memorabilia. Before long you could start to get a lot of
pop up advertisements for sports cards.
The software can track your surfing habits and send the data to
advertisers who will then send specific advertisements toward the demographic
that they want.
Sometimes
this deviant software will decide to change system settings or keep records of
all buttons pressed on the keyboard. So
if you decide to purchase something online with a credit card, potentially this
information could be stolen. Basically
this software can do all sorts of bad things, but perhaps most annoyingly as
you get infected with more and more Spyware your computer will begin to slow
down more and more. Often times causing
system instability and computer crashes.
Now that we know what Spyware is and what
it does, how does it become installed?
There are actually multiple ways in which this malware becomes
installed. The first of which is an
unintentional download. Perhaps you are
visiting a website and you get a dialog box that pops ups informing you that
your computer is not safe against viruses and that if you click on the download
button you will be protected. Innocently
enough you decide you don뭪 want to become infected with a computer virus so
you click on the Download button. Before
you know it you are infected with Spyware.
Sometime you
may decide to install a free program to listen to music or to check the
weather. Without your knowledge as a
밷onus� you also get Spyware incorporated into your software package. Perhaps as you are online you get hit with a
computer virus or worm. There are now
viruses and worms that do nothing but download and install Spyware onto your
computer.
We now know what Spyware is and how we get
it so what can we do to help prevent getting it or to get rid of it if we
already have it? Just as the old TV
commercial said 밙nowledge is power.�
The fact that we know how it becomes installed is perhaps the greatest
tool we have against becoming infected in the first place. But there are times when no matter what we do
we still become infected. So if this is
the case there is a great piece of software available to help deter the Spyware
in the first place and most importantly to get rid of the Spyware we have.
This software
is called SpyBot and can be downloaded completely free from http://www.safer-networking.org. Once installed there is an update feature
that should be ran in order to make sure the version you are running has the
latest Spyware definitions installed.
Then it will ask if you would like to install a feature that will help
immunize against known Spyware.
Definitely click on Immunize button.
Now that the software is installed click on the Check for Problems
button and let the scan begin. After a
few minutes the scan should complete and you will see a list with boxes infront
of the name of each Spyware infection.
Make sure that there are checkmarks in all of the boxes and click on the
Fix Selected Problems box. It is a good
idea to run this tool about once a week always checking for updates first to
help minimize infections and keep your computer Spyware free.
