Protect your PC against spyware

[Al-khiyal]

Downloads to protect your PC

Free programs that can sweep your PC for spyware and remove it:

Spybot Search & Destroy

Lavasoft Ad-Aware Personal

[Bent_Bladi]

i have spybot, but i feel like after a while it loses it's touch... ... i dunno...

[sania]

Coz..thieves are always one step smarter than the police!

Free downloads themselves may contain hacksaw blades.

[Cheba_Mami]

What is the best free antivirus software? i'm tired of buying it each year... please tell me

[Al-khiyal]

Free download and regular updates, excellent reputation:

AVG Anti-Virus Free and AVG Anti-Spyware Free is for private, non-commercial, single home computer use only.

AVG Anti-Virus Free AND AVG Anti-Spyware Free

[piccolomondo]

My vote is for Ad-Aware and Avast, as a second option (the AVG as #1). Once Panda was OK for me, but I simply decide to stop using services / sites that force us to IE, even if I can open an IE Tab in my fav browser.

In any case, I preffer any online virus scanner than a desktop antivirus SW running in the background 24h/7.
But I recognize that I take more care more of the 'chicken' then enjoy its 'eggs'.

[piccolomondo]

Amit Agarwal [l a b n o l . blogspot.com]:

"Don't Pay For Virus Protection, Get these Free Anti Virus Software"

Free Online Virus Scanners [run inside the web browser to scan your hard drive]

Trend Micro HouseCall - An online virus scanner that's absolutely free and scans your PC hard drive for any sort of viruses or even spyware. HouseCall allows you to remove detected infections. Works with Firefox and IE. Requires Java.

McAfee Freescan - This free virus scanner from McAfee is based on the McAfee VirusScan engine. Requires IE with ActiveX.

Windows Live OneCare Scanner - From Microsoft that cleans your system from viruses and also recommends ways to improve the overall performance. Part of Windows Onecare.

Symantec Internet Security - From the developers of Norton Antivirus 2007 can detect most virus threat but there is no option to delete the virus infected file or repair it. Does not examine compressed files. Requires IE with ActiveX.

BitDefender Online Scanner - Their Free Online Virus Scanner version 8 scans your system's memory, all files, folders and drives' boot sectors - the default options automatically cleans the infected files. Requires IE with ActiveX.


Free Anti Virus Software for Windows [Requires Installation]

Avast! Home Edition - One of the most popular antivirus software, can also be run from Explorer context menu. You can either scan the entire hard drive or selected folders. Ships with an Antivirus screen-saver.

AOL Active Virus - From AOL based on Kaspersky Antivirus that doesn't require an AOL account to download the software. The software can be configure to check only new and modified files thereby reducing the memory requirements. Also support scanning of incoming and outgoing email messages.

ClamWin Virus Scanner - An opensource antivirus software that is great for running routine antivirus checks on your PC. You need to manually scan a file in order to detect a virus or spyware.

AVG 7.5 Free Antivirus - One of most popular free virus scanning software is AVG 7.5 Free Edition (read comments). Initially, there was confusion whether AVG 7.5 would be free like AVG 7.1 but the good news is that AVG 7.5 Free edition is already available for non-commercial, single home computer use.