39 replies to this topic

[concertina226]

With more and more new spyware and adware programs being created every day, more and more spyware removers are becoming obsolete... which ones do you use?

Spybot Search and Destroy has stopped working for me, so I switched to using the Yahoo! Toolbar Anti-Spy Detector, which seemed pretty good for a while until the other night when a nasty spyware program managed to crash the program before it could continue the scan!

So I checked Download.com and they had this wicked new free program called Spyware Doctor. It does a full computer scan of every single file and removes ALL spyware, adware, bad cookies, toolbars... all sorts of stuff!

I installed it on my comp and ran the scan, and it found 1069 infections in my computer! So yeah, I personally think this is a really cool program... apparently if you buy the full version it gives you realtime anti-spyware blocking and toolbar blocker, whereas the free version just gives you the spyware remover and realtime updates, but not bad, eh?

So do you know any other good free anti-spyware/adware programs?

[Saint_Michael]

good luck most people who create the spyware and adware know about the programs that block them yahoo don't work

try webroot it worked ok

[Klass]

I would download and run these programs listed here:
http://www.astahost.com/spyware-adware-rem...-all-t5246.html

Install, Update, Scan. Definatly do the free ones. After you run them once, reboot, run them again, Reboot (fingers crossed) the issues should be gone.

[gfu]

Cool!!
im using Spybot - Search & Destroy as well!
its pretty good and free!!

[alicia91]

I have Ad-Aware SE Personal and it is free, it works really good.
Spybot - Search & Destroy doesn't work as good because I had it installed on my computer and I had Ad-Aware SE Personal installed at the same time and I did a scan with Sbybot and it found 1 or 2 spyware.
With Ad-Aware SE Personal it found over 100 sbyware, ad-ware and even malware.

[Shifty510]

gfu, on Jun 24 2005, 09:22 AM, said:

Cool!!
im using Spybot - Search & Destroy as well!
its pretty good and free!!

yeah i use that to it okay but it gets the job done

[Pipirupi]

I use ad-aware

first of all, its shiny =w=

and it removes most malwares and I usually use it with spy-bot.
I heard that spydoctor is pretty good, and i might download sometime to check if my adaware missed anything.

But right now, my adware is running fine and its more than enough for me. ^^

Use firefox if u can, it reduces the number of adwares and spywares u get! (by a lot, but doesnt mean you wont get it at all

[Joshua]

Pipirupi, on Jun 24 2005, 05:08 PM, said:

I use ad-aware

first of all, its shiny =w=

and it removes most malwares and I usually use it with spy-bot.
I heard that spydoctor is pretty good, and i might download sometime to check if my adaware missed anything.

But right now, my adware is running fine and its more than enough for me. ^^

Use firefox if u can, it reduces the number of adwares and spywares u get! (by a lot, but doesnt mean you wont get it at all

I'm pretty content just using spybot and ad-aware, most computer professionals I know recommend those ones. I actually heard of them first from an instructor in one of my computer classes, Mr. Skaggs.

I've heard of Spydoctor but never tried it myself. I also have something called Hijack This on my computer which shows all the executables and stuff on your computer that affects stuff, but it's more for an expert user who knows what to get rid of and just needs to find it. Pretty powerful tool though.

[FuChelle]

Like so many others here, I also use Ad-aware. It seems to work pretty good. I have Spybot S&D too but I rarely use it because it doesn't seem to work as well...I don't think so anyway. Occasionally it finds 1 or 2 things that Ad-aware doesn't find but that's very rarely, so I tend not to use it.

I also have SpywareBlaster, which is good. It's like a firewall but for spyware, and it stops spyware and adware from even being loaded onto your computer in the first place. Since I started using SpywareBlaster, the only things I've found from Ad-Aware scans have been tracking cookies from a few websites, which is pretty good....means it must be doing it's job.

[ARNEL]

Both of them are good, spybot destroyer, yahoo anti-spy, micros spyware are ok, but the things is, some program or spyware program don't detect with some other programs.. like spybot detect spyware from the microsoft while microsoft don't do. Microsoft detect spyware program from yahoo while yahoo don't do....

It,s up to you which of them your're going to used.

[lamode]

yea, i agree spybot is an excellent free program, you can also try Microsoft AntiSpyware, they are still in beta now but the scan speed is pretty fast and the result is not too bad. i personal perfect PestPatrol, this is not free, but i have this say this is probably the best anti spyware program i have ever seen. this program almost decetect everythings, somebody say this is too sensitive as this program detect p2p programs aswell, such as winmx,kazza and limeware. but for me this work perfect once i have put the in the "exception" list, maybe the speed is not too fast, took me about 15 mins to scan 25 GB files, but the result is awsome.

[wariorpk]

I use Spy Bot Search & Destroy. It is very reliable and updates once in awile. There is also a feature to block adware in IE.

[cryptique91]

I'm currently using Webroot Spy Sweeper 3.5 and the paid version of Ad-Aware SE (professional)? Both worked great.
I think Webroot Spy Sweeper is the most careful spyware scanner i've used. Ad-aware is good in deleting junk on my pc.

[fsf-clan]

Ad Aware is what im using, and so far its the best ive used i also mcaffee but i guess that's more for viruses and i use antivir but again i think that's more towards finding viruses then spyware and adware so i guess ad aware is the best

[iwuvcookies]

You can use ZoneAlarm in conjuction with the spyware program. Its good in preventing spyware from starting on your computer. Its really good. I"m using it now for like a whole year or so.

[ruckusbag]

I used to have Ad-Aware and run it weekly and I would get a number of infections and all the stuff. Then my brother showed me this program called CCleaner. It basically cleans out your temporary internet files (where a lot of bad stuff is) and your cookies. The program also can analyze your registry and detect/delete unused file extensions and other stuff. Well I ran CCleaner, it cleaned out almost 2gb of stuff. Then I ran Ad-Aware and it detected NOTHING. I pretty much run CCleaner everyday now.

Also if you have you ad/spyware programs a good thing to use is hijackthis. It detects programs that run alongside windows. Basically you should run it then if you see anything you are unaware of, search on google the name and there are a lot of sites that tell you what the program is.

CCleaner
Hijack This

Good Luck

[HotArt]

I use Spybot - Search & Destroy and it is normal for me! It works good! Maybe use it too!

[BuffaloHelp]

concertina226, on Jun 24 2005, 11:54 AM, said:

So I checked Download.com and they had this wicked new free program called Spyware Doctor. It does a full computer scan of every single file and removes ALL spyware, adware, bad cookies, toolbars... all sorts of stuff!

I downloaded Spyware-Doctor and it was pretty nice. It picked up things that were not recognized by Spybot and Symantec Anti-virus Corporate Edition v.10 (has built-in malware and spyware block). However, during the loading process it was keep trying to tamper with my SAV (Symantec Anti-Virus). I don't like anything that tampers with my SAV!

Thank goodness that I enabled tamper-proof on SAV. I may not understand how Spyware-Doctor runs but I sure don't like it.

Edit: spelling

Edited by BuffaloHELP, 04 July 2005 - 10:11 PM.

[maresan]

I used AD-aware SE, spybot - search and destroy, Xsoft spy, and they were all ok.

Except the last one - does anybody know this Xsoft spy? It found some strange "trojans" in my win/system directory and I didn't trust it anymore - especially with my nod32, that didn't find anything and I trust nod32 very much.

Then I tried spyware doctor and it does a good job for me. It has a few great features. For now I recommend it and also AD-aware SE. It also does the trick...

However spam is inpossible to be completely banned from computer - No matter the software - it is necessary to do at least weekly updates and scans to clean all the garbage you have pulled from the web. It is the best and probably the only way.

[Lyon2]

The best free is:

ad-ware

The best shareware, so, you should try, is:

webroot spysweeper

[strawberrie]

FuChelle, on Jun 30 2005, 11:51 PM, said:

Like so many others here, I also use Ad-aware. It seems to work pretty good. I have Spybot S&D too but I rarely use it because it doesn't seem to work as well...I don't think so anyway. Occasionally it finds 1 or 2 things that Ad-aware doesn't find but that's very rarely, so I tend not to use it.

I also have SpywareBlaster, which is good.

I use the exact same programs!! Spybot, Ad-aware SE Professional, and SpywareBlaster combined definitely gets the job done. But then again, if you use Firefox, you shouldn't have too many problems with spyware and whatnot.

I've actually tried Spyware Doctor before, but it didn't really accomplish anything...

[curthard89]

get ad-aware, its free

[goldinero]

I use Ad-aware 6 by Lavasoft. It's free and works quite well. I also avoid using MS Internet Explorer since it is a magnet for spyware. The Firefox browser keeps a lot of the nasties out.

Goldinero

[skynet]

try your hand on Windows AntiSpyware
altough it's still beta, but it's really great! added it's free!

[Lessur]

I use Spybot - Search & Destroy and Adware [free version] They work very well together I think.