dock98 Posted February 19, 2008 Share Posted February 19, 2008 Spyware seems so ubiquitous these days that it's hard to remember it wasn't always so. I first wrote about the topic in 2000, and in that same year Patrick Kolla started developing a program to counter the threat. In the early 2000s, Kolla's Spybot was one of the few antispyware utilities available, and it became hugely (and deservedly) popular. Unfortunately, over the years it hasn't kept up with modern malware. I stopped recommending it some years ago. But when we ran our roundup, Nine Ways to Wipe Out Spyware there was a great outcry at its omission. Apparently, many of you stuck by this elder statesman of spyware long after I gave up on it. I decided that if so many of you still swore by it, I owed it to you to put the latest version of Kolla's app through the same tests as all the rest—either to confirm your opinions or to warn you that Spybot didn't measure up. Accordingly, I ran the current version, Spybot – Search & Destroy 1.5, through my standard testing regimen.The program hasn't visibly changed in years. It's still separated into a main Spybot scanning module and a real-time protection module that goes by the unusual name of TeaTimer. Installation is quick and it leads you through getting the latest updates and running its immunization process, which is supposed to prevent certain unauthorized changes to your system. I was a bit surprised at the date on the latest immunization files: July 25, 2007. That was over six months ago—not a good omen for Spybot.—Next: Can It Search and Destroy?I installed Spybot on my usual test systems, each infested with several malware samples such as adware, spyware, Trojan horses, rootkits, and rogue antispyware products. The utility seized up during the fixing process on a couple of systems, forcing me to cold-boot and start over. On one system, the software threw a ton of error messages and then blue-screened, but on reboot the scan worked. While the process was a little rocky, it wasn't any worse overall than what I experienced evaluating Spyware Doctor with AntiVirus 5.5.The cleanup process was rendered extremely tedious by infighting between Spybot's two personalities. To clean up many found threats, the program had to delete the Registry items that caused the threat to launch at start-up. But the real-time protection module reported the Registry change attempt and asked me whether to allow it—every time! Worse, whenever Spybot found an in-use file, it created a Registry entry to delete that file at the next reboot. Here, too, the real-time protection module flagged each change and asked me whether to allow it. Talk about the left hand not knowing what the right hand is doing! On one system I had to answer more than 60 of these pop-up queries. Why can't it just quietly take care of business, like the competition? In order to make sure it had the best opportunity to succeed at malware cleanup,I carefully checked the "Remember this decision" box and clicked "Allow change" every time it asked whether to allow its own Registry changes. But wow, what a waste of time!In a number of cases, because the utility couldn't delete certain files (they were locked by the malware), it asked to reboot and rescan during the boot process so that it could delete those files before other programs loaded. But even with this boot-time advantage, Spybot didn't do a very good job of cleaning up the infested systems. It totally missed about a quarter of the samples and failed to fully remove almost half of those it did detect. Some were visibly still running. Overall, the program scored 6.0 points out of 10. That edges out the latest version of another venerable spyware fighter, Ad-Aware 2007 Pro, which got 5.9 points, but many products score 9 or better on this test. Spyware Doctor with AntiVirus 5.5 scored 9.5, and Panda Internet Security 2008 got a full 10 of 10. In short, if you've got an infested machine, Spybot is not the app I'd recommend for cleaning it out.On a separate test using commercial keyloggers instead of malware, Spybot totally missed half the samples and failed to remove most of those it detected. Several of them were still running and logging keys after Spybot allegedly removed them. The product scored 2.5 out of 10 on this test, beating Panda's score of 2.1. By contrast, Norton Internet Security 2008 wiped out all of the keylogger samples, for a perfect 10 of 10. This test isn't of critical importance, but, still, the results aren't encouraging for Spybot.—Next: Can It Keep Me Safe? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LoKz Posted February 19, 2008 Share Posted February 19, 2008 I like this prog is good ;) and its free Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dock98 Posted February 19, 2008 Author Share Posted February 19, 2008 I like this prog is good ;) and its freei used to like it too;however,read the test results. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
shought Posted February 19, 2008 Share Posted February 19, 2008 I like spybot too, but the things said here are quite disturbing... I guess i'll start looking into other products, but as for now it's still spybot for me, because of it's great past. Sure was interesting to read dock ;) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LoKz Posted February 19, 2008 Share Posted February 19, 2008 Yeah i missed quite alot... i dint think it was that bad i might start lookin for a new one Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dock98 Posted February 19, 2008 Author Share Posted February 19, 2008 Yeah i missed quite alot... i dint think it was that bad i might start lookin for a new onei tried ewido and it worked pretty well. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LoKz Posted February 20, 2008 Share Posted February 20, 2008 i'll give it a go ;) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
myidisbb Posted February 20, 2008 Share Posted February 20, 2008 commercial keyloggers being missed. like it said the others miss it too. most likely the commercial company complain, asked, or had a deal with them to allow it.remember lava adware allowing bearshare and other adware etc deal Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KotaXor Posted February 20, 2008 Share Posted February 20, 2008 Being using Spybot and Ad-aware for years, but after what you said, I think I will look for a better one. Any recommendation?What about Counterspy? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KotaXor Posted February 20, 2008 Share Posted February 20, 2008 Just remove my Ad-aware and found that it just doesn't want to go away. On boot up the blue screen show "lsdelete program is missing------autochk ........". Found out that is part of Ad-aware.Finally, manage to remove it. Some programs just doesn't want to be remove leaving residue behind!!!!!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dock98 Posted February 20, 2008 Author Share Posted February 20, 2008 Being using Spybot and Ad-aware for years, but after what you said, I think I will look for a better one. Any recommendation?What about Counterspy?never tried counterspyi tried ewido and it worked pretty well. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dock98 Posted February 20, 2008 Author Share Posted February 20, 2008 ewido purchased by avg.see my post in software news Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RobrPatty Posted February 21, 2008 Share Posted February 21, 2008 Norton Antibot is by far the best antispyware software I've ever used. Works perfect on Vista 32 & 64. Saved my butt many times.Problem is.....I'm now running Server 2008 and it's a no go with Norton Antibot. Almost ready to go back to vista.It's that good. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KotaXor Posted February 21, 2008 Share Posted February 21, 2008 ewido purchased by avg.see my post in software newsNo more ewido, it is now called AVG Anti-spyware 7.5. Now what? Which shall I try now? Counterspy? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KotaXor Posted February 21, 2008 Share Posted February 21, 2008 Just out of curiousity, is Windows Defender any good? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dock98 Posted February 21, 2008 Author Share Posted February 21, 2008 ewido purchased by avg.see my post in software newsNo more ewido, it is now called AVG Anti-spyware 7.5. Now what? Which shall I try now? Counterspy?i tried avg anti spyware and thought it was a good program. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
shought Posted February 21, 2008 Share Posted February 21, 2008 ewido purchased by avg.see my post in software newsNo more ewido, it is now called AVG Anti-spyware 7.5. Now what? Which shall I try now? Counterspy?i tried avg anti spyware and thought it was a good program.I've got it installed too, didn't find me anymore than spybot. But still i'm sticking with it for some time, to see how it works and all. Doesn't look bad... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
elbebo Posted February 27, 2008 Share Posted February 27, 2008 Just cleaned a pc with adware that couldn't be deleted. Caught it with Spybot S&D! I don't rely on it too much but occasionally it'll catch those that others miss and I like that about it! I heard Spy Sweeper was the best though. Haven't tried it out... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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