How to Protect Your Computer from Spyware and Adware

In this tutorial I will show you how you can protect your Computer from Spyware and Adware. Protection is better then cure, so we will first understand how Spyware and Adware are spread and infects your computer.

How Spyware Comes?
As explained in the previous section, spyware arrives bundled with freeware or shareware, through email or instant messenger, just clicking on a WEB page, or by someone with access to your computer. Once it is copied on your drive, it secretly installs itself and goes to work. This process is also called Hijacking. The spyware is difficult to detect, and difficult for the average user to remove.

Spyware comes in many flavors like Tojan Horses, System Monitors/key loggers, Adware, Adware Cookies etc.

Protect against Spyware and Adware
It is impossible to protect against spyware without any anti-spyware software. Old antivirus programs don't prevent adware, so use the one of the latest antivirus. These days most popular antivirus products includes adware and spyware scanning. For example, the latest versions of McAfee VirusScan, Norton AntiVirus 2004, and Trend Micro PC-Cillin 2004 now scan for some adware and spyware.You should always keep your windows updated with the latest updates. Latest windows updates are also very important.

Prevent Unwanted Installation
You should always prevent unwanted installation of the software. Before installing any software windows asks for the confirmation. So, make sure that the program you are installing do not include any adware.

Install a pop-up blocker
There are many free pop-up blockers are available in the market. Use any of those and install on your computer. You can use MSN Toolbar or Google Toolbar. These software prevent the unwanted pop-ups and the chances of getting spyware installed on your computer goes down.

Use the firewalls
Firewall is very important these days, a good software firewall protects computer from being attacked. It will block attacks from a remote location and also block software from hijacking your computers network connection. You can use the following firewalls:

• Tiny Personal Firewall (http://www.tinysoftware.com)
• Norton Personal Firewall (http://www.symantec.com/sabu/nis/npf/)
• McAfee Personal Firewall (http://us.mcafee.com/root/package.asp?pkgid=103)
• Zone alarm (http://www.zonelabs.com)