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9 warning signs
of Adware and Spyware |
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When you start your browser, the home page has mysteriously changed. You change it back manually, but before long you find that it has changed back again. |
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You get pop-up advertisements when your browser is
not running or when your system is not even connected to the Internet,
or you get pop-up ads that address you by name. |
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Your phone bill includes expensive calls to 900 numbers that you never made-probably at an outrageous per-minute rate. |
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You enter a search term in Internet Explorer's address bar and press Enter to start the search. Instead of your usual search site, an unfamiliar site handles the search. |
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A new item
appears in your Favorites list without your putting it there. No
matter how many times you delete it, the item always reappears later. |
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Your system
runs noticeably slower than it did before. If you're a Windows 2000/XP
user, launching the Task Manager and clicking the Processes tab
reveals that an unfamiliar process is using nearly 100 percent of
available CPU cycles. |
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At a time when
you're not doing anything online, the send or receive lights on
your dial-up or broadband modem blink just as wildly as when you're
downloading a file or surfing the Web. Or the network/modem icon
in your system tray flashes rapidly even when you're not using the
connection. |
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A search toolbar
or other browser toolbar appears even though you didn't request
or install it. Your attempts to remove it fail, or it comes back
after removal. |
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And the final
sign is: Everything appears to be normal. The most devious spyware
doesn't leave traces you'd notice, so scan your system anyway. |
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