What are Adware & Spyware
Adware:
Adware is short for advertising-supported software. Programs displaying advertising material fall under this category. Adware applications will often automatically open a new pop-up window containing advertisements in an Internet browser, or change its homepage. Adware is often bundled with freeware programs, allowing the freeware developers to cover development costs of their (usually useful) applications.
Adware itself is not dangerous – users will only be bothered with advertisements. Its danger lies in the fact that adware may also perform tracking functions (as spyware also does).
If you decide to use a freeware product, please pay particular attention to the installation program. Most installers will notify you of the installation of an extra adware program. Often you will be allowed to cancel it and install the program without adware. However, in some cases programs will not install without adware, or their functionality will be limited. This means that adware may often access the system in a “legal” way, because users have agreed to it. In this case, it is better to be safe than sorry.
If there is a file detected as adware on your computer, it is advisable to delete it, since there is a high possibility that it contains malicious code.
Spyware:
This category covers all applications which send private information without user consent/awareness. They use tracking functions to send various statistical data such as a list of visited websites, email addresses from the user’s contact list, or a list of typed keystrokes.
The authors of spyware claim that these techniques aim to find out more about users’ needs and interests and allow better-targeted advertisement. The problem is that there is no clear distinction between useful and malicious applications and no one can be sure that the retrieved information will not be misused. The data obtained by spyware applications may contain security codes, PINs, bank account numbers, etc. Spyware is often bundled with free versions of a program by its author in order to generate revenue or to offer an incentive for purchasing the software. Often, users are informed of the presence of spyware during a program’s installation to give them an incentive to upgrade to a paid version without it.
Examples of well-known freeware products which come bundled with spyware are client applications of P2P (peer-to-peer) networks. Spyfalcon or Spy Sheriff (and many more) belong to a specific spyware subcategory – they appear to be antispyware programs, but in fact they are spyware programs themselves.
If there is a file detected as spyware on your computer, it is advisable to delete it, since it most likely contains malicious code.
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