how to protect your computer from spyware

Some 7 to 8 years ago (around 1999) spyware was spread with a freeware game which was Elf Bowling. It had a secret spying software with it. From that period spyware has created crises in computer world.

Spyware is installed secretly when you install some downloadable software onto your computer. Most of us, do not read the agreement when downloading, and it mentions that there software will install a spyware onto their computers.

Spyware behaves as an independent executing programmer. It is so well arranged that it has power to monitor your keystrokes, and it can change your web browser's home page, it can read cookies, can scan files on your hard disk, can install other spyware applications & even spy on other programs or documents, such as word files or chat programs. Through Spyware a person can get all information which he needs as this program helps in spying, and a person can use this information either for marketing/advertising purposes or even he can sell this information to some other advertising or marketing agents.

What are the steps you can use to protect your computer from spyware?

Most important thing is a person will always like to protect his personal informations like password, bank accounts info and other critical & confidential informations. There are some four useful steps to protect your computer with this dangerous spyware software.

- Foremost important thing is install anti virus software and do updating regularly.
- Your operating system should be updated regularly.
- Utilization of firewall is a must.
- And most important is to utilize anti spyware software.

Installing anti virus software:

If you have installed anti virus software than relax, because it prevents virus to get attached to the programs in the computer and keeps away from corrupting the files. You may be aware of many reliable anti virus software available which are already downloaded free of cost from the net. But it is compulsory /must to update the anti virus software to prevent threat from newer viruses.

Do a regular update of your operating system:

It is better to install all the security programs as early as possible. For that just simply utilize the automatic updating option which is available in the computer. If you have a pirated copy of Windows OS, the automatic update of the security patches may not work. That is why using an official copy of Windows XP (or other) OS is highly recommended.

How can you utilize firewall?

Nowadays many Antivirus softwares come with inbuilt firewall protection. I highly recommend using Quick Heal Antivirus Software. Its antivirus database updates are very frequent, usually once a day, and has inbuilt personal firewall. If you do not have firewall protection enabled then it becomes easy for hackers to search and seek your unprotected computer and do all sorts of bad things like deleting files, steal your confidential data, corrupt it with viruses or trojan horses. If you have already installed the firewall security, it prevents the hackers from access to your pc.

There are 3 types of firewall security available :

- Wireless routers - it is used for wireless network.
- Hardware routers - used for office or home networks which are connected to internet.
- Software firewalls - for individual or single computer.

From this information you must have come to know that anti spyware with the antivirus software protects your computer from all sorts of malicious code doing damages to your computer. It gives you peace of mind and let you work at your computer efficiently without errors, system crashes and most important it keeps your data safe.