What is Adware?
It's hassle, but it's not dangerous. The clever stuff delivers pop-ups relevant to the type of sites u visit. Or, it might just load your machine with porn ads, just as your mum walks in.
What is Spyware?
Spyware can be planted without u even knowing about it. It's a complete data capture program and will monitor sites u visit, recording everything u do on there. Really technical spyware can record keystrokes- so u could be giving away passwords, credit card numbers and other private details.
What is a direct dialler?
It basically replaces your usual dial-up with a premium rate number. When u access this premium rate number, porn sites and other programs will invite themselves onto your comp. U'll then spend the rest of the year trying to prove that you're not a porn fiend.
U can avoid installing direct diallers by triple checking anything that asks if u'd like to install it. Clicking the No button is sometimes not good enough for direct diallers - they are designed to trick u into downloading them (who'd seriously click Yes to paying 10 times the usual connection charge?)
To zap all of the above, u'll need one of these programs:
