What's a spyware & addware? What damage will it do to the pc?

Answer 1

Adware: serves up ads on your computer, whether you like it or not. Makes money for someone.

Spyware: watches what you do (sites you visit, files on your computer, etc) - sends this info off. Makes money for someone.

Damage - they install stuff that shouldn't be there. Ideally (for them) it would be of no consequence, and you'd never notice it. In reality, it usually bogs things down, takes up bandwidth, etc. Sometimes Adware software will take care of it. Sometimes, if it's pretty well entrenched, you'll need to bite the bullet and reinstall the OS.

Answer 2

Spyware is software that tracks your computer's activity. It could be as minor (but intrusive) as tracking which websites you visit, or it could track your every click and keystroke (Social Security Numbers, credit card numbers, private conversations, whatever you use your computer for) to transmit to an identity thief.

Adware is annoying, but less destructive. It creates popup ads based on your activity. These ads clog your computer's memory and slow down your browser. Adware often has a spyware or data mining component to it, so that it knows what to advertise.

To eradicate the programs already on your machine, you should get a quality freeware program like Ad-Aware [1], or buy a security suite like Norton Internet Security [2]. The more upscale software, like Norton, has monitoring functions to prevent adware and spyware from getting onto your computer in the first place.

Answer 3

The Addaware and spyware programs are booth good at getting mivs things off your hard drive that shouln;t bee tbere Run both ptograms beciause 1 program minght not gett them all outt so it's best to use two. This will also help make your computer run some what faster, You should do his at least once a week.

Answer 4

In my opinion they are both very serious threats, not only to your computer - but to your sanity. I would suggest that you look into the free offer by Microsoft if you qualify (probably if you are a subscriber) but if not, go to any search engine such as Yahoo, Google, (or even Microsoft, Netscape & others) and type in SPYWARE & "free protection." You will find a large selection, but they probably are not as good as the expensive ones. Norton and Webroot have good propriatary protection CDs.

Answer 5

Depends on the program. Some will cause ads to pop up on your PC continually, slowing everything down. Others can actual steal information from your computer and transmit it over the Internet to someone else. Others will destroy data on your hard drive or worst.

Answer 6

It can do all kinds of stuff including identity theft. Get Spyware Doctor. It found all kinds of parasites lurking in my computer. Works much better now. Well worth the money.

'nuff said?

Answer 7

spyware will track your web surfing habits and report back to whomever sent it. Then you will get popup's and e-mails geared to your surfing habits. Adware will cause excessive popup's. They both will bog down your computer and make it run real slow. Get a free copy of spybot and adaware, install and run them to keep your computer running clean and quick

Answer 8

it will destroy it
adware is advertising pop up with your browser being open us adaware from download.com to fix
spyware watches you and can get all your keystrokes or other important stuff

Answer 9

It will literally, kill your computer. Worse virus' out there.

Answer 10

those are virus. they make your computer run slow