Spybot Search and Destroy 1.3: Tutorial Transcript


This is a tutorial on how to download, install, and run the Spybot
Search and Destory security program. Spybot Search and Destroy detects
spyware and adware that has infiltrated your computer through the
Internet. Windows users, especially fans of Internet Explorer, are
particularly vunerable to unwanted installation of spyware and adware.
Consequently, a program such as Spybot should be used along with
anti-virus and firewall protection. Windows users must also keep up to
date with all security updates and patches available from Microsoft.
Spyware and adware are computer software programs that gather and report
information about a computer user without the user's knowledge or
consent. Aside from the loss of privacy caused by spyware, the
consequences of a moderate to severe spyware infection generally include
a substantial loss of system performance and major stability issues.

Spybot is free to download and use. Windows users can download Spybot
from UT's bevoware or other online sources, such as download.com. Spybot
is not available for Mac or Unix operating systems. I am going to
download the program from UT's bevoware security section. The Spybot
setup wizard will guide you through your preferences in how you'd like
Spybot to run. I want to save Spybot to my program files on my C drive.
I want the full installation. I do want Spybot to create a short cut in
the start up menu. Review your preferences and install. And we have now
completed this part of the setup.

In the secondary part of the setup process, Spybot asks if whether you
want to create a registry backup for your files. It doesn't hurt to
this. When this process is complete, you can hit "next" and we will
search for the most recent updates of Spybot. And we will download all
of those available updates. The Spybot Search and Destroy interface is
very user-friendly and all the tools are well explained. My tutorial
will only cover the use of the default mode in Spybot. Spybot also has
an advanced mode, if you would like to use that instead.

The first step is to check for problems. Spybot will a run check against
all its known spyware definitions to see any of these are on your
computer. After running a scan, you'll be presented with a list of
spyware found on your computer. This scan produced eight problems. We
have Doubleclick, which is a tracing cookie, Avenue A which is also a
tracing cookie, and the DSO Exploit. You might notice that the DSO
exploit problem is connected to Microsoft files. This is a common
occurence as DSO Exploit is a security gap in the Internet Explorer,
Outlook, and Outlook Express systems. Microsoft closed this gap with
security updates. Please be sure that you have all your current Windows
updates and patches installed. With the updates and patches, this
security gap will not be a threat to your computer even though Spybot
will still detect it. A future program update of Spybot will fix this
bug.

We do, however, want to eliminate this two tracing cookies that were
picked up on our computer. If we want to find out more information about
these systems, clicking on this bar to the right will give you a bit
more information. In any case, we are going to fix these selected
problems.

Under the recovery page, Spybot keeps lists of items that were found to
be problems earlier, in case you want to recover them. You might find it
useful to recover certain items, if their removal has effected the
desired functionality of an application. Some Internet applications may
work more efficiently if cookies are installed, for example.

The Immunize page allows you to protect yourself against future attacks.
Apparently, Spybot has found that there's a large number of additional
protections possible.

We want to click "immunize"...in order to block those products. Another
important item on this page is the Browser Helper, and this address
problems that come through Internet Explorer specifically. So, we can
enable permanent blocking of bad addresses in Internet Explorer.

Spybot does not automatically search for updates the way that some other
security programs do. You should check for new spyware definitions and
other updates, and install them, regularly. You can do this from the
Update page: do a search, and then download available updates.

The level of spyware infection on your computer varies according to your
Internet usage. I would recommend running Spybot once a week or so.