The Tlog – a technology blog

Spyware is a big problem these days. Most Windows PCs have a lot of it, without the user’s knowledge; many crashes, slowdown, popups and browser hijacking (for instance, changing the home page without your consent, and you can’t set it back to what you want) are symptoms of a spyware infestation.

Avoiding spyware

1. Do not, I repeat, do not use Internet Explorer. Really. This is the most important part. Use Mozilla Firefox (my personal favorite), Mozilla, Opera or Konqueror. Explorer is unsafe, and malicious sites can use it to install dangerous software on your PC without your knowledge. It also (as of version 6.0) lacks many modern features such as browser tabs. In fact, you should not use IE even if spyware didn’t exist – but spyware by itself is also enough reason to use a decent browser instead of Explorer.
2. Do not use Outlook Express. Much like IE, it’s insecure. Use something like Mozilla Thunderbird, or a webmail like Gmail or Yahoo! Mail.
3. Avoid Microsoft Outlook, unless it is forced upon you at your workplace. And if so, see below for Office Update.
4. Turn Windows’ automatic updates on (go to Windows Update if you need assistance), and make sure they are working (you should be warned about critical updates from time to time). Install all of them.
5. If you have Microsoft Office installed, go to Office Update from time to time, and keep Office updated.
6. Have a decent anti-virus installed.
7. If you’re not behind a firewall, install a decent one on your PC, or, even better, keep it behind one (preferably not a Windows machine)
8. Beware of what you install. Many programs advertised as “free” install spyware along with them. Avoid the following above all:
   • Browser toolbars (they’re for Internet Explorer, anyway, so you won’t need them, right?)
   • Mouse cursors
   • Anything related to a purple monkey
   • Anything, in a web page, that pretends to be a Windows error message (e.g. “Warning: your PC is unoptimized!!!”)
9. Install Ad-Aware, keep it updated and run it from time to time, deleting any spyware it finds.

Note: a non-firewalled, non-updated Windows PC connected to the Internet gets infected by worms (*) in minutes – far less than the time it takes to update it. If you have such a PC in your hands, think hard before connecting it to the internet – if you can’t install a firewall software on it (from a CD, you can’t connect to the net before you are protected, remember?), take it to a friend with a NATted LAN (your geek friend will know what that means), and update it there.

(*) worms are not spyware, but they can, among other things, install spyware on your computer (and, besides, do even more harm than spyware)

Removing spyware

1. Install Ad-Aware
   • run it
   • check for updates
   • check for spyware
   • remove any it finds
2. Install Spybot Search & Destroy
   • run it
   • check for updates
   • check for spyware
   • remove any it finds
3. Reboot
4. Do the first 2 steps again.

• if neither program finds any spyware this time, you are clean. Come on, breathe in relief.
• if, however, any of them still finds spyware, repeat everything one more time. If there is still spyware, then removing it is beyond the scope of this page… Look around in Google, or ask a geek friend, or format and reinstall everything.

Note

Spyware is strictly a Microsoft Windows problem; you can forget about all of this if you use another operating system, such as Linux or MacOS.

Another Note

Contrarily to what most people think, it is not “normal” for a PC to become slower and slower as it’s used, until you have to format and reinstall to get it back to a “sane” speed. If that happens, your PC is simply probably full of spyware (and possibly viruses, worms and such).

Yet Another Note

If you are currently “weaning” yourself from Internet Explorer, it’s likely that you’ll open it from time to time, due to force of habit. As any such use is a potential doorway for spyware to enter your computer, a possible solution, for slightly more advanced users (again, asking a friend should not be out of the question), is to use a proxy server to limit Internet Explorer to Windows Update.

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This entry was posted on Monday, August 29th, 2005 at 12:30 and is filed under Browsers, Security, Spyware, Windows software. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.