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These are the Anti-Spyware pages.

Currently, the only way to totally stop spyware from invading your pc is to unplug your modem and never go online.

While that may be an option, most people are not going to want to do that.

So, I've put together some documentation on some free utilities that will hopefully help keep your PC just a little more spyware free.

Below are some links to where you can download these programs and also some links to some instructions I've put together
on how to run these programs. You should download all 3 programs and run them on a regular basis. How regular depends
on you. I would suggest weekly, but you need to judge for yourself how infected you think your PC is.

(Note that clicking on the download links below will open up a new browser window.)

Download Spybot - Search and Destroy

Download Ad-Aware SE Personal

Download Microsoft AntiSpyware(beta)

And here are some guides to using the above programs. These guides are very basic and just cover basic scanning of a PC.

For more in depth help, consult the help guide/menu that came with the program or search online for more information.

Guide for Spybot - Search and Destroy

Guide for Ad-Aware SE Personal

Guide for Microsoft AntiSpyware(beta)

Safe Mode

If you think your PC is badly infected - your getting a lot of pop ups, you can't start the task manager, your system is running very slow, - then you should start your PC in Safe Mode and run all 3 programs one after another. To start in Safe Mode, you need to press the F8 key right before Windows starts. On most PC's this will be right after the BIOS screens that first show up when you turn your PC on. Sometimes this information will not show on screen, you'll just have a black screen until Windows starts loading. You just need to press F8 a few times while your screen is black. It might take several reboots to get it right, but eventually you'll have a DOS screen listing several choices one of which will be Safe Mode. If you get this DOS screen but don't see a choice for Safe Mode then press F8 again and you should see it.

Once you select Safe Mode, it will take much longer than usual for your PC to come up. That's ok, just be patient.

After it is up and you have logged in, run all three programs. Then reboot your PC and log in normally to check things out.

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