by Tamaal Ghosh

Created on: October 03, 2009

The Good, The Bad and ...

Whilst ther are certainly very many free applications available (and not only to guard against and remove spyware), great care need s to be taken that these apps aren't thmeselves vectoring spyware or, worse, viruses.

Yes, it does happen; a company or individual that provides anti-spyware apps sometimes also include the very monsters they purport to attack There are also increasingly-common website banner ads now falsely warning of a hijacked or infected syatem and telling users to purchase programs which often don't the remove spyware or add more spyware of their own!

One company, at least, was forced to return some of its heinouslly-ill-gotten gains. In 2006, Microsoft and the Washington state attorney general filed suit against Secure Computer for its Spyware Cleaner product. At the end of that year, the SAG was able to announced that $1 million had been by the conning company paid to settle with the state. Microsoft's case against Secure Computer was still pending at the time.

A reliable site - one which always tests for such hidden extras - is CNET's Download.com. They have been reported in Wikipedia to have said that it will only keep files that pass inspection by Ad-Aware and Spyware Doctor. This have nor been verified by a citation but it is keeping with their general practice ethos..

A word of caution before you wade in, though. Unless you know at least roughly what you're looking for, once you go in, you might never come out! The domain is absolutely chocker with information, opinions, reviews and, of course, programs.It's all done by people with at least semi-professional knowledge if not actual coal-face experience.It is VERY easy to get side-tracked and lost.

I would add that I have absolutely no association whatsoever with either CNET or Downlad.com; my only status with them is that of a frequent user - a semi-addicted junkie, perhaps.

Ino the anti-spyware breach, then. Over the years, I personally have used a number of apps to combat the sickos who write and send all types of malware. The first line of defence - the sandbags on the beach, as it were - has always been a firewall. These allow you limit what goes into and out of your system. They are "devices configured to permit, deny, encrypt, decrypt, or proxy all (in and out) computer traffic between different security domains based upon a set of rules and other criteria." (Wikipedia).

I won't go into geeky egg-head details except to say that both hardware and

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