Free Spyware Removal Is For Real! But Is It Enough To Protect Your Privacy Online?
Published December 3rd, 2007 in Articles, SecurityHave you wondered whether free spyware removal is for real? The truth is that yes, free spyware removal does exist, although you are limited to only two softwares to choose from. Actually, you have to use both of them to be more protected against spyware and adware.
When I started to look for a spyware protection, I did search for a free spyware removal solution, and found out that there is SpyBot Search&Destroy and the free version of Ad-Aware only. I downloaded and installed both of them. I did a full scan with both of them… and bang… I realized that they found a lot of spyware on my computer.
The shocking truth was that there were infections found by only one OR the other free spyware removal tool ONLY. The reason, you ask? Not every program knows about every spyware infection, so there is no such thing as the perfect free spyware removal tool. As of writing SpyBot Search&Destroy has a spyware definition base of 83.900 infections, the free version of Ad-Aware knows more than 112.000 malicious programs.
Using free spyware removal tools for removing spyware is pretty easy. These free spyware removal tools are designed to used by everyone. Just follow the steps outlined below and your computer will be spyware free.
Step-by-step instructions to do a free spyware removal
1) Download both free spyware removal tools and install them.
2) Update both free spyware removal tools immediately (both spyware removers have an UPDATE button).
3) Do a spyware scan with both of them. In SpyBot Search&Destroy you have only one type of scan, a normal scan, but in AdAware you can have a quick, a smart and a full scan. Choose the full scan as you want to be thorough.
4) Wait patiently, as the scans can take up to 15-25 or even more minutes (depending on your computer’s speed and the number of files you have on your hard drive).
5) When the free spyware removal tools finished the scans, get rid of the infections by clicking the REMOVE button.
6) For ongoing protection do a software update and a do spyware scan at least once a week to make sure you stay clean from infections.
Congratulations, you just have cleaned your computer from spyware and adware - or at least one part of them. Why? Not every program knows about every spyware infection, so there is no such thing as the perfect spyware removal tool. It is best to use more software simultaneously to make sure that you’re actually completely removing ALL spyware infections from your computer, not just those that are known by one tool. It is a good idea to mix free spyware removal tools and paid tools as well.
The paid spyware removal tools provide additional services that are quite useful:
- permanent protection of your computer (they set up a shield and protect you from spyware in real-time),
- automatic updates (they update the software and the database by themselves, you do not have to care for it),
- scheduled scans of your computer (set it up and forget about it) ,
- blocking of malicious tracking cookies,
- registry protection (malicious software attack the registry quite often), - and more…
Go and find out for yourself what spyware removal tools work best on YOUR system.
I also tell users that they need to find what works best for them. As you said, not every program may have the same definitions as another program.
To my mind all the free stuffs cannot be perfect as they are only created to attract attention to the developer and sell the paid versions. The other thing I want to say is that there is really impossible to create a good protection with one product only. The protection should be based on the complex of programs. As an example here is my configuration, and it is the one I recommend. Note that there is no free software in it. So, here it is:
1)Comodo Firewall(personalfirewall.comodo.com) that is managing all the internet connections and prevents any unwanted of them.
2)Anti-Keylogger(anti-keyloggers.com) that is protecting you against keyloggers. The reasons for me choosing thi product is that it uses methods of heuristic analys instead of signatures. That is why: 1)There is no need to update it to be totally protected, 2)It protect from all the type of keyloggers, even from the newest ones.
3)NOD32 Anti-Virus(eset.com). I chose this one because it gives a very strong real-time protection without consuming a lot of PC resources.
Wish you to be totally protected