you. Claria Corporation's Gator Software and Exact Advertising's Bargain Buddy are examples. The user receives many pop-up advertisements. Adware and spyware are similar to viruses in that they can be malicious in nature. However, people are now profiting from these threats, making them more and more popular. Similarly, software bundled with free, advertising-supported programs such as P2P act as spyware, yet people are willing to download it. This presents a dilemma for proprietors of products whose removal tools may inadvertently disable wanted programs. For example, recent test results show that bundled software (WhenUSave) is ignored by popular anti-spyware program Ad-Aware, (but removed as spyware by most scanners) because it is part of the popular eDonkey client. To accomplish their goal, this group of anti-spyware companies, academics, and consumer groups have collectively published a series of documents including definition of spyware, risk model, and best practices document. Spyware, virus and worm: Unlike viruses and worms, spyware does not usually self-replicate. Like many recent viruses; however, spyware—by design—exploits infected computers for commercial gain. Typical tactics furthering this goal include delivery of unsolicited pop-up advertisements; theft of personal information (including financial information such as credit card numbers); monitoring of Web-browsing activity for marketing purposes; or routing of HTTP requests to advertising sites. Routes of infection: Malicious websites attempt to install spyware on readers' computers. Spyware does not directly spread in the manner of a computer virus or worm: generally, an infected system does not attempt to transmit the infection to other computers. Instead, spyware gets on a system through deception of the user or through exploitation of software vulnerabilities.
create significant unwanted CPU activity, disk usage, and network traffic. Stability issues, such as applications freezing, failures to boot, and crashes, are also common. In some infections, the spyware is not even evident. Users assume in those situations that the issues relate to hardware, Windows installation problems, or a virus. Some owners of badly infected systems resort to contacting technical support experts, or even buying a new computer because the existing system "has become too slow". Badly infected systems may require a clean reinstallation of all their software in order to return to full functionality. Rather, a computer is likely to have multiple infections. The cumulative effect, and the interactions between spyware components, causes the symptoms commonly reported by users: a computer, which slows to a crawl, overwhelmed by the many parasitic processes running on it. Moreover, some types of spyware disable software firewalls and anti-virus software, and/or reduce browser security settings, thus opening the system to further opportunistic infections, much like an immune deficiency disease. Some spywares disable or even remove competing spyware programs, on the grounds that more spyware-related annoyances make it even more likely that users will take action to remove the programs. Examples of spyware: Internet Optimizer, also known as DyFuCa, redirects Internet Explorer error pages to advertising. When users follow a broken link or enter an erroneous URL, they see a page of advertisements. Zango: (formerly180 solutions) transmits detailed information to advertisers about the Web sites which users visit. It also alters HTTP requests for affiliate advertisements linked from a Web site, so that the advertisements make unearned profit for the 180 Solutions Company. It opens pop-up ads that cover over the Web sites of competing companies.
Symantec, McAfee and Sophos have come later to the table, adding features to their existing products. Symantec Anti-Virus, for instance, categorizes spyware programs as "extended threats" and now offers real-time protection from them (as it does for viruses). Recently, the anti-virus company Grisoft, creator of AVG Anti-Virus, acquired anti-spyware firm Ewido Networks, re-labeling their Ewido program as AVG Anti-Spyware Professional Edition. Zone Labs, creator of Zone Alarm firewall have also released an anti-spyware program. Microsoft Anti-Spyware, in real-time protection blocks an instance of the AlwaysUpdateNews from being installed. Anti-spyware programs can combat spyware in two ways: 1. They can provide real time protection against the installation of spyware software on your computer. This type of spyware protection works the same way as that of anti-virus protection in that the anti-spyware software scans all incoming network data for spyware software and blocks any threats it comes across. 2. Anti-spyware software programs can be used solely for detection and removal of spyware software that has already been installed onto your computer. With this spyware protection software you can schedule weekly, daily, or monthly scans of your computer to detect and remove any spyware software that has been installed on your computer. This type of software scans the contents of the windows registry, operating system files, and installed programs on your computer and will provide a list of any threats found, allowing you to choose what you want to delete and what you want to keep. Such programs inspect the contents of the Windows registry, the operating system files, and installed programs, and remove files and entries which