2 November 2007

Spybot Search and Destroy - How to Use It

In a past Tutor Tip (Spyware: They Know Who You Are and What You're Doing), I explained what spyware is and why you should avoid it. The Tip included a reference to Spybot Search and Destroy, one of the best spyware removal programs. Spybot is free to download (http://www.safer-networking.org/index.php?page=spybotsd) and use, but a few people have difficulties with some of its finer points.

You should run Spybot at least every other week and immunize your system from attacks. Before scanning your computer, be sure to update the detections so you can find and remove the latest threats.

Update Spybot’s Detections

1. Click the Update tab on the left side of Spybot’s main window.
2. On the Updater screen, click the Search button.
3. You will be asked to select a download place. Choose the site that is highlighted and click Continue.
4. A list of available downloads will be shown with a tick mark next to recommended downloads.
5. Click the download button.
6. When the downloads are completed, click the Exit button at the bottom of the Download screen.

Immunise Your Computer
Spybot allows you to immunise your Web browsers against most spyware.

1. Click the Immunise tab on the left side of Spybot’s main window.
2. A list of browsers currently installed on your computer will be shown, along with the names of the browser subsets you can immunise. The number of items unprotected and protected will be given. You need not do anything with the list itself.
3. Click the Immunise button at the top of this screen to apply immunisation to all of your files.

Check for Problems and Remove Them

1. Click the Search & Destroy tab on the left side of Spybot’s main window.
2. Click Check for Problems. You will see the scan progress in the status bar at the bottom of the window. You can stop the progress at any point by pressing the Stop check button that has just appeared (it will vanish again once the check has finished). This will take some time to complete a scan (as much as an hour).

If the scan has found something, the list will show it. There are three basic kinds of results:

• Red entries indicate spyware problems that should be fixed to avoid security and/or privacy problems. This is the only kind of problem that is preselected to be fixed.
• Green entries indicate usage tracks. It can do no harm to remove these.

For most of the problems there is more information available. On the right side of the window you will find a grey button. By clicking it a window will open and show you some information about the item selected (if there is none selected, you can simply click on it and the information will be displayed).

You can now select the problems you want to fix, by clicking the checkbox in front of it, or by selecting all using the button Select all problems (this button will only be available after enabling the expert button setting in advanced mode). More selection options are available if you look into the context menu (by right-clicking a problem). The context menu will also allow you to exclude single problems or whole products from further scans (you may later change the exclude settings in the settings section/Ignore...). Another option the context menu offers is to copy or export the result list or a full report.

Once you are sure you have selected what you want to be removed from your computer, press the Fix selected problems button. You will see the fixing progress at the bottom status bar.

If some problems cannot be fixed right now (because they are still loaded and can't be terminated, for example), Spybot-S&D offers an option to run on next system start, so you can check and fix again.

Should you notice at any later point that you have removed more spyware than you wanted, you can always restore it from the Recovery in the Spybot-S&D-section.

You can also fine-tune your scan options by selecting special File sets and changing some Settings.