patndoris TechnoGeek

Agent 007, you have been assigned Mission Possible. Should you choose to accept it, your goal is to search out and destroy the truly nasty of the nastiest malware on your computer. This mission is easier than you think with Spybot Search & Destroy in your bag of tricks.

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OK, so it’s not a super secret covert operation. It’s actually pretty simple. Spybot is a step up from the other programs I’ve written about. It can perform tasks some of the others can’t. While there are many "advanced" options in Spybot, the typical settings are probably sufficient for most users. The first step is to float on over to Filehippo (uh…that was a little “hippo humor” there - you were supposed to laugh…or at least crack a smile) to download and install Spybot. In keeping with my previous posts, I’m not going to try and recreate already well done tutorials. If you need basic help or instruction on how to download, install and run the program - please see this excellent tutorial on Bleeping Computer.

Now, here’s where I differ in opinion from the tutorial. There are a couple things that seem to slow down my machine with regard a "typical" installation of Spybot. I DO NOT recommend using SDHelper or TeaTimer. SDHelper integrates and works with Internet Explorer to help block spyware from ever reaching your machine. In theory, this is good. However, it means your computer ?has some thinking to do? (to be read with a Desi Arnaz accent) each time you click a link. The result is a possible slow down of your browsing. Depending on a number of variables, such as the speed of your computer and your internet connection speed, this can range from barely noticeable to a big nuisance. If you run regular cleanup for malware - you will achieve the same overall result. As for TeaTimer - it constantly runs in the background, monitoring for system changes and alerting you before they actually happen. Again,  good in theory, but in reality it’s just another thing to slow down your system. I strongly recommend you do not enable (or disable if you’ve already installed them) these features.

Another interesting feature of Spybot is immunization. You can "block" certain sites from even being able to drop anything on your machine. Ahem…If you are in the habit of visiting some of the more adult oriented sites, you may find some won’t display as expected after you immunize. A recent post by my good friend Eagle_Kiwi on his Multiply blog highlights a better reason you may not want to utilize this feature. If you’d like to know more about Spybot and your hosts file take a peek at this Eagle_Kiwi blog entry. I immunized for years, but after reading Eagle_Kiwi’s post, I un-immunized and have suffered no ill effects thus far.

As with any malware protection, it is critical you update your definitions each time you run the program. Spybot makes this task very easy, offering up an unbelievable number of download servers from which to choose. The latest versions of this software serve up a scan that’s faster than any of the other programs I use. I’ll admit, Spybot finds a lot less of the "routine" things. It doesn’t show you hundreds of cookies you’ve amassed each week. But it does find really nasty offenders you might run across. And in my personal experience, it does a darn fine job of cleaning them up too! The most I’ve ever had to do is reboot and allow Spybot to re-scan to remove even some of the most notorious of the baddies. (And for the record, they were not on my laptop, they were on the machine my 13-1/2 year old male offspring uses, but fails to regularly clean up.)

I have never had to resort to using manual removal methods. I was quite impressed with how well Spybot handled Vundo, CoolWebSearch, and SmitFraud (to name a few of the nasties the male offspring’s computer seemed to have acquired). While it doesn’t find a lot on a weekly basis for me, I definitely run Spybot just in case something bad has wormed (pun intended) it’s way onto my machine. This is one tool I want in my super secret special agent arsenal.