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Anti-Virus Software
There are many flavors of anti-virus software on the market. Gainig
ground with the big boys, McAfee and Symantec, the free, AVG is providing very dependable protection.
One benefit with installing a well known anti-virus application with an annual subscription fee is that they
typically have a zero-day infection promise. This is when they promise that very few computers will get
infected on the very day that a virus is released into the wild. However, most of the free anti-
virus programs are trying to make name for themselves, so they are hot on the heels of the others
in terms of effectiveness. Click the following links for these anti-virus programs:
AVG
McAfee Anti-Virus
Norton Anti-Virus
Anti-Spyware
Spybot Search & Destroy can fix problems with tracking cookies, system internals
(Registry), Winsock LSPs, ActiveX objects, browser hijackers and BHOs, and can to some
extent protect a user's privacy by deleting usage tracks. Spybot also includes an "Immunize"
feature to block the installation of spyware before it occurs. Spybot is not intended to replace
anti-virus programs, but it does detect some common trojans. To go to the download and tutorial pages
for Spybot S&D, click here.
Anti-Malware
Ad-Aware is the latest version of Lavasoft’s anti-spyware
solutions. Ad-Aware allows computer users to combat malicious spyware and malware;
it protects users from spyware that takes control of a computer and can result in aggressive
advertising pop-ups, sluggish computer activity and stolen private information. Ad-Aware
detects hazardous content on a user's computer, identifies the threat level, and then gives
the user the ability to remove unwanted content.
Lavasoft’s Code Sequence Identification (CSI) technology detects malware and then searches for
similar codes in order to identify emerging variants. Ad-Aware scans the computer's memory,
registry, Hosts file, hard, removable and optical drives for known data-mining, aggressive
advertising, parasites, scumware, keyloggers, Trojans, dialers, malware, browser hijackers,
and tracking components.
Ad-Aware is compatible with Microsoft Windows operating systems only. To download
Ad-Aware, click here.
Another anti-malware tool I recommend is Malwarebytes, available online, click
here
to download.
Hijack Software
HijackThis! can generate a plain text logfile detailing all entries it finds,
and most entries can be removed or disabled by HijackThis. Inexperienced users are often advised to
exercise caution, or to seek help when using the latter option, as HijackThis does not discriminate
between legitimate and unwanted items, with the exception of a small whitelist of legitimate entries —
thus allowing a user to unintentionally prevent important programs from running, which may cause their
system or its peripherals to stop working. HijackThis will, however, attempt to create backups of the
files and registry entries it removes, which can be used to restore the system in the event of a mistake.
A common approach is to post the logfile to some web board/forum where more experienced users will help
ecipher which entries need to be removed. Automated tools also exist that analyze saved logs and attempt
to provide recommendations to the user, or to clean entries automatically. Use of such tools, however, is
generally discouraged by those who specialize in manually dealing with HijackThis logs; they consider the
tools to be potentially dangerous to inexperienced users, and neither accurate nor reliable enough to
substitute for consulting with a trained human analyst. To go to the download and quick start guide pages
for HijackThis, click here.
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