Spybot – Search & Destroy
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Spybot - Search & Destroy (sometimes known as Spybot-S&D) is a malware, spyware and adware removal program for Microsoft Windows. Like most malware scanners, Spybot-S&D scans the computer hard disk and or RAM for malicious software.
Spybot was written by German software engineer Patrick M. Kolla, and is distributed by Kolla's company PepiMK Software. Development began in 2001 when Kolla, still a student, wrote a small program to deal with the Aureate/Radiate and Conducent TimeSink programs, two of the earliest examples of adware.
Spybot - Search & Destroy is currently released as freeware.
Spybot Features
Spybot is able to fix problems with tracking cookies, system internals, Winsock LSPs, ActiveX objects, and browser hijackers. Spybot can to some extend be able to protect user privacy, by deleting usage tracks. Spybot is not intended to replace anti-virus programs, but it does detect some common trojans and keyloggers. Its "Immunize" feature and HOSTS file can be used to block the installation of spyware before it occurs. Another tool included in Spybot is a file shredder, for the secure deletion of files.
As some programs which ship with attached spyware or adware will refuse to run should the unwelcome co-programs be removed, later versions of Spybot allow it to replace the spyware binaries with inert dummies (designed to fool those programs which insist on the spyware's presence). Versions from 1.3 "innoculate" the system (in a manner similar to anti-virus programs), blocking the installation of new spyware programs (rather than simply detecting them on a subsequent scan).
To remain efficient against new threats the program needs to be updated and used frequently.
Spybot is available, for all versions of Windows from Windows 95, and offers several different languages and skins to users.
Support is currently only supplied by means of web-forums, and some professional deployers have complained that they have been unable to resolve some of the complex Windows registry problems posed by Spybot's removal of some entrenched malware programs.