From: Twilla Pirbright of Nether Potterbridge Under Wold

Q. What is Spyware and do I need it?

Dear Twilla,

A. Spyware is so called because it installs itself s urreptitiously on your computer and then quietly gathers information about your surfing habits, bank passwords and other key financial data and then reports this information back to its maker (for 'maker' read 'crook').

How do they get onto your computer in the first place? The can be disguised in downloads such as toolbars, search engines, browser accessories, screen savers and other seemingly helpful utilities.

How do you know if your computer is infected with spyware? There are several symptom, the most obvious of which are:

• You receive frequent popup advertisements
• Your homepage taken over by an unfamiliar website
• Your computer becomes increasingly sluggish and may become unstable
• A new toolbar is  added to your Internet Explorer browser without your knowledge
• Your browser is slow to open and / or requested pages are slow to load
• Your searches are redirected to unfamiliar websites

If you have noticed any of these then you may want to check whether the cause is a spyware infection or something else.

Software such as Norton Internet Security and Bullgaurd Internet Security have spyware filters build in, but if you don't want to spend money on all the other bells and whictles that come with them there is software available that will just deal with spyware.

There is a website called SpyNoMore where you can run a free scan. If this shows positive you can then buy the SpyNoMore software and remove the offending files. The cost is $29.95 (about £15.00 at the time of writing) and is well worth it if you do have a problem. Click Here

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