You’ve heard the phrase “know thy enemy.” Well, here are your most common spyware enemies (source:FaceTime Security Labs). Don’t be fooled – spyware is not a game. It costs individuals and corporations millions of dollars each year. Spyware can be used to watch your surfing habits, steal credit card information, or just be a nuisance. In any case, it’s a royal pain. Know they enemy.
1. Gator – Gator is installed by users as a password vault. That means that passwords can be recalled for you automatically when visiting sites. The trade-off for this service is that you have to endure pop-ups when visiting certain sites. Claria, the maker of Gator,has cleaned up its act a little by labeling the pop-up ads, but they’re still annoying.
2. CoolWebSearch – This has got to be one of the most notorious browser hijackers out there. This is the name given to a program with many different variants that redirect users to coolwebsearch.com or datanotary.com. Uninstallation can be extremely complex. Users shouldn’t try to manually remove this software.
3. 180SearchAssistant – This software...