Spyware removal.....hmmmmmmmmmmm?

[shack]

For years I've been running both Spybot Search and Destroy and Ad-Aware SE. Just recently added MS Windows Defender to get rid of spyware. I usually ran all three programs (and updates) 2-3 times a week. Mind you these are all the free downloads so you get what you pay for I guess. I noticed recently that Spybot rarely turned up any new "issues and/or threats" while Ad-Aware and Defender were still turning up several each scan. I recall a while back that SpyBot was sued and agreed to NOT remove certain bots from "some" companies under the terms of their agreement. At the time that bothered me but not enought to stop using it. Last week I was running my maintenence utilities and noticed I was getting a lot of disc errors related to Spybot. Same when I was defraging. I thought what the hell....It was dragging down the maintenance...so I removed and deleted (thoroughly) Spybot.

Lo and Behold! I went from getting 50-75 spam emails a day (I get a daily summary from my mail server of spam that is auto removed) to just a couple and sometimes NONE. Coincidence? Maybe. I do know that Spybot will not be downloaded again on my computer. Any of you guys running Spybot notice anything similar?

[read-alot]

Same deal with Spybot. Made me wonder WTF was going on. I will remove it.

[schwarcw]

What alternative Spyware removal programs are out there?

I wonder why they were sued?

[Holydoc]

What alternative Spyware removal programs are out there?

I wonder why they were sued?

I have found that Webroot Spy Sweeper is an excellent program for preventing and removing spyware/addware. However it is not free.

[WilliamM2]

[QUOTE][I noticed recently that Spybot rarely turned up any new "issues and/or threats" while Ad-Aware and Defender were still turning up several each scan. /QUOTE]

The real question is: How are you getting "several issues and/or threats" each week when you run these programs? Careless use? Are the kids using the computer? Downloading freeware? I have never found any spyware or even a virus on any of my computers, so the idea of getting infected every week puzzles me.

But I do love spyware, as I make a good chunk of change on the side, cleaning it off others computers. I have noticed that all of the various programs will find things the others don't. Just yesterday I cleaned one up for a client, and he was running defender. Spybot found 8 items that defender never picked up, ad-aware found three more after that. So I think they are all usefull.

And the spam is probably just a coincidence, I've had Spybot on my machine for years, and don't recieve spam in my email.

[bobman1235]

Hmph. Never had any issues with Spybot, but now I'm curious.

Keep in mind also that all of those things that Ad-Aware keeps finding are just cookies and MRU lists, mostly, the VAST majority of which are completely harmless.

[Roy Munson]

I've been running Spybot for a long time and haven't had any issues with it either. I also use Ad-Aware. As has been said, some of these programs seem to be better at doing different things better than the other. Meaning one program might find something another doesn't and vice versa.

[honestaquarian]

Remember,ALL antispy and antivirus programs have different blacklists.Meaning they ALL look for different things.At this point in time it really doesn't matter WHERE yo surf the net.Just going on line means your computer is at risk.It isn't just porn sites dumping spyware,adware,trojan horses,VX2 bugs,etc into your computer.Even the mainstream sites like Yahoo and Ebay have been guilty of such in the past.Take a look at the link below to see some of the problems out there in the world of anitirus and security.
http://www.zdnet.com.au/blogs/securi...9264249,00.htm

[nadams]

Also check out the new ewido anti-spyware, from Grisoft, makers of AVG antivirus

http://free.grisoft.com/doc/20/lng/us/tpl/v5

[HBombToo]

My wife loves to research real estate. She is addicted and will spend hours on end comparing properties. I have ran adware and the likes and my main deterent for anything major has been Norten. Over the past few months I have not had time to actually play much on the web or even here for that matter while at home. Well a couple weeks ago the sherry began complaining how slow the computer was and she wanted to take it in for service. My pucker factor was peaked and I figured since its been so hot I'll go ahead and do some work on the machine.

I immediatly deleted all non essential programs like AIM and so forth. I thoroughly deleted all old files that I knew I did not need any longer. I optomized the disk and deleted all old internet files and anything else then compressed the rest. I did a defrag then a reboot and it was much better but still not right.

I then jumped onto the PC Tools site and ran the free registry mechanic which I NEVER did on this machine. I had the tools at work but never really cared to do anything at home... When I ran it there were thousands of bad files so I hit a couple other sites and did a comparison with that freeware with the same result. At that point I went back to the PC tools site and purchased the registry mechanic and after a full run and fix the computer felt like a "NEW" machine.

Now to this post and reading Shacks confusion... After the success I had with the registry mechanic I went back to PC Tools and did the same deal with their their free try on the Spyware Doctor. I had thousands of occurrances after the first run and was totally floored. I mean what the hell is that Norten junk supposed to do anyway? It blocks incomming trash and viruses I figured but hell I didn't realize how far off I was. That said, I bought the Doctor and cleaned off the machine.

Now the computer is running so good I went and cleaned up the windows start up found and applied a utility called bootviz which has taken the performance of this machine to a level I could not be happier with. Granted the initialization of Norton and the Spyware Doctor take up a few minutes at start but now I can go from a shut down through restart with a 1 smoke break.

Oh I also made some changes to the registry after finding this site
http://arstechnica.com/guides/tweaks/sgp-tweaks.ars
and completed all suggestions and so far so good. BTW I'm on Windows XP so I don't know about all the other systems out there...

Well that my deep dive into IT and I could not imagine doing this stuff for a living:( That said if I dissapear you'll know my computer crashed and burned after all this trouble.

Brett... You proud of me;)

HBomb

[brettw22]

Congrats Henry......;)

A friend of mine said that he's had a lot of problems with Norton as of late as well and he got me onto a different program called NOD32. I haven't had any problems and the scans it does are more involved and quicker than that of the Norton that I've been using for years.

I'd encourage anyone to check it out for the 30 day trial that they're offering it for, and see if ya like it. It's a no-frills program, but then again doesn't seem to need them to take care of the problem.........

[HBombToo]

I just finished up with the NOD32 deap scan and it found 2 more problems. Now before bed, I'm thinking how far does this rabbit hole go?

Oh well, my fun meater is pegged!

HBomb

[brettw22]

My experience with most of the ada/spyware programs out there are that some catch some things and some catch others, but none catch all........which is more of a PITA to me than anything. I've done an immediate full system scan with some adaware programs before right after a full system scan finished and still come up with a bunch more things.....i'm like, what's the point.....

I haven't had anything found on the NOD32 program, but everything's current so that's a good thing. Apparently it flags anything (worms, virus', and ada/spyware) in the counts, so don't worry that you don't see anything flagged a certain label.

Also, in looking at the logs, it's normal for files to repeatedly show as "file locked" as those are core windows files, so don't worry about that.

[HBombToo]

Also, in looking at the logs, it's normal for files to repeatedly show as "file locked" as those are core windows files, so don't worry about that.

I'm glad you mentioned that and thats what I was hoping when I was looking at the file paths...

Thanks for the help and good night.

HBomb