Besides the well publicized Viruses, Trojans and Worms there are many other ‘software programs’ that can harm your computer. Most of these will just annoy you or make your computer run really slow. However, occasionally your computer can become so badly ‘infected’ with such a horde of these annoyances that it will cease to run.

The first category of Parasite Software is spyware. You will need to run the following three software programs to remove any spyware from your system. You can configure Spybot to immunize your system and block future spyware.

Spybot Search & Destroy

Ad-Aware SpyWare Removal Personal Edition 1.05 Download Now

Even if your PC has Ad-aware and Spybot Search & Destroy, you still can't stop some versions of an insidious and virus-like pest called CoolWebSearch. Fortunately, a Dutch student who goes simply by the name Merijn wrote a tiny (128KB) free tool called CWShredder that specializes in removing dozens of CWS variants.   Download it here. http://www.majorgeeks.com/download4086.html

How did this spyware get on your computer in the first place?  And what is it?

Well, first of all if you ever installed Kazza you really got ‘infected.’  Kazza loads tons and tons of spyware on your system.  (We tried to warn you in  Kazza: The Unstoppable Worm and Kazza P2P Viruses and Worms)   Fortunately, there’s a version of Kazza called KazzaLite that does not have any spyware. Unfortunately it’s no longer available.  Fortunately you can search the regular Kazza for it. J

Note that KazzaLite is still subject to the problems outlined in Kazza: The Unstoppable Worm and Kazza P2P Viruses and Worms.  You've been warned.

There are also many ‘normal’ websites that install spyware.  For example the Internet radio station that I listen to won't play unless I leave their ad banner spyware program installed.  However the ‘seedier’ the website the more spyware it is likely to have. 

So what is it? 

Spyware is software that is installed without your explicit knowledge or permission that runs in the background every time you start your computer.  To say it has a profit motive would be an understatement.  It will try to use any trick it can to steer your activities over its way.  It may for example take over your internet search function of your browser so that anytime you search you will be directed over to the spyware's search function which is weighted heavily in favor of their sponsors.

Or it may actually track your surfing habits so that it can offer you custom tailored advertisements.  The possibilities are endless but the bottom line is that the software running in the background uses up your system resources (CPU and memory).  In addition certain functions like 'searching' may take longer because now you are using a web site that does not have the same horsepower as MSN Search.  Or even worse the web site may be down so now you have to wait and wait and wait while your attempt to access the site times out.

The next major category of Parasite Software is just every piece of software that you ever installed thinks that it is the sole reason for the existence of your PC. This is true for example for:

• Microsoft Office (Do you really need that shortcut toolbar running all the time?)
• RealPlayer which installs itself in the background so that your music files will launch in one half second instead of three seconds
• Quicktime Video player, same reason. Now you can launch a .MOV file a few seconds faster at the cost of slowing down everything else you do with your computer.
• Here's another tip.  You can burn CD's and/or DVD's without having the entire Roxio Software Suite running in the background.  If you remove these background tasks your CD/DVD burning program won't automatically start when you put a blank disk in the drive but you can still burn a disk by lauching your burning software from the Start Menu.
• The list goes on and on and on ...

Get Rid of it and get your computer back. Use one of these programs to administer programs that launch themselves on startup. I like StartupCopPro.