Free Spyware Clean Tools

There are hundreds if not thousands of free spyware removal tools for the Windows operating system. The choice ranges from to popular spyware removal tools such as Windows Defender, Spybot Search And Destroy or Spyware Terminator to lesser known anti spyware software programs and even so called rogue applications that look like spyware removal tools but are in fact malicious in nature. 

This article will concentrate on two lesser known free spyware removal tools. The first program is called Roguefix. It has been designed to counter so called rogue applications. The tool has been specifically designed to remove rogue scanners, desktop and homepage hijackers, trojans, codecs and miscellaneous malware.

Roguefix comes as a simple batch file that has to be executed in Windows safe mode.

The tool will then scan the operating system for spyware and remove detected spyware automatically from the computer system. The free spyware cleaner is only compatible to the Windows XP operating system according to the software developer.

SmitfraudFix on the other hand can scan a Windows XP or Windows 2000 operating system directly. The user needs to boot into safe mode for the removal process though. The program will generate a report after the scan which will list all the malicious files found after the spyware scan.

Both tools have been designed to detect and remove rogue applications only which does limit their usefulness in day to day spyware scans. It is however a good idea to have them at hand in case the computer system gets infected by rogue spyware.

New Face Of Security: Windows Defender

Windows Defender is a Microsoft security software product that is included in the Windows Vista and Windows 7 operating system. It is also available as an option download for the Windows XP system. The program is a anti-spyware program that can scan a computer system for malicious software and delete or quarantine the findings.

Windows Defender comes with the usual options to automatically update the program and schedule regular system scans to protect the computer system. Default actions for low, medium and high alerts can be defined that will be executed by the anti-spyware program automatically.

Microsoft’s anti-spyware solution comes with the interesting advanced tool Software Explorer which can display extensive information about startup programs, currently running programs, network connected programs and Winsock service providers.

Each program and provider is sorted by company which makes it easier to find non-Microsoft programs that are running or connected to the computer system. 

Microsoft has improved Windows Defender over the years. The company did receive lots of criticism in the beginning which can be attributed to a low spyware detection rate. Several anti-spyware products have performed better in tests, outlined here or here. Please note that the tests linked in this article have been performed about 10 months ago and that the situation may have changed in the mean time.

Which leads to the question: Are you running anti-spyware software? If so which?