Best Spyware Scan Programs

Spysweeper has a good reputation in general, and its latest version integrates antivirus/antispyware functions into a sort of "Security/Privacy Suite" - a move which makes a lot of sense; its something becoming common among security/privacy applications. There's also a stand-alone antispyware-only version for a few bucks less.

One downside to the integrated version is that the antivirus doesn't feature real-time eMail or chat/messaging scanning, though the antivirus/antispyware functions do a pretty good job of intercepting and blocking threats brought in by eMail or chat/messaging clients before they can take root in your system and start screwing things up. Be aware also that with antivirus and antispyware integrated into a single app, scans will take a while - though less overall in most instances than individual antivirus and antispyware scans run independently.

For the price, the integrated version seems to me a decent value, and if you have more than one machine, a 3-user license is only a few bucks more than the single-user license, which could be attractive.

As mentioned, Security/Privacy suites are becoming more common, and certainly are the wave of the future. Though typically a little costlier than an assembly of equivalent stand-alone apps from different vendors, the price differential, all things considered, isn't very significant and the convenience factor of having various functions combined into one app designed to let all functions work together (at least in theory) pretty well balances out any price advantage.

A decent, fairly comprehensive overview of the current state of Privacy/Security suites is available HERE

I have recently used sunbelt counterspy and found the program to work quite effectivly. However it does seem to hog resources when in active protection mode and is another program to load at startup so i have deleted it.

I have been running Computer associates e trust security suite for quite some time "firewall" "A/V with active protection and "pest patrol with actve protection."
Yes recently I was ambushed but that was my fault not the security programs fault.
I found the firewall easy to set up (unlike some others) and the only problems I have are when linking from A2k to you tube I get a page of script.
in this case I just close the firewall refresh and click the link again. On another site I can not see uploaded photos until I shut down the firewall and refresh. I could probably fix both these by placing them in my trusted sites. I must say though that I do have difficulty with registering sites as trusted sites I am just not quite sure how to do so. All in all I find it (to my limited experience) a satisfactory security program.

When I reloaded my new hard drive last month, I got a new Norton 2007 anti-virus. I wanted to install the virus scan before I accessed the internet to get the firewall program. I ran to Wal-Mart to get a disc, and they had only a small choice of virus scans.

Afterwards, I checked, and learned that there are other anti-virus apps that are considered stronger than Norton, but the Norton has served me well over the years, so I will stick with it for now.

I also use the regular Zone Alarm firewall. I am happy with both of them, so right now, I am not considering a suite, but a stand-alone spyware removal program.

I think that I am going to look into the stand alone Spysweeper in depth. I have read a number of reviews of it, and it seems, so far, very positive. I have a number of weeks to make up my mind.

spysweeper will no longer fix anything unless you purchase.
Major geeks
some good info is available at the above thread and it is updated regularily

I think you need an active protection spywer/malware program. One that will remove stuff as you download and another to use as a diagnostic tool. one thing is for sure you do need to have at least one alternative to your active spywear protection.
spybot, adaware and counterspy all seem good as an alternative. they all seem to pick up different things.
CA's E trust pest patrol can be purchased as a stand alone active protection and will be (I'm pretty sure) compatable with zone alarm as (I think) E Trusts firewall is basically the same program with a new skin.

Norton can be resource hungry but if your happy with it go ahead and use it.

dadpad- Before I bought Counterspy, I used both Ad-Aware and Spybot.
They were good, and did catch different things, but I was looking for the simplicity of one spyware program. The thing that is good about spyware programs, as opposed to virus scans, is that you CAN have more than one on your computer, without worrying that you will mess something up.

More than 1 running at the same time? as active protection? That is (to my limited knowledge) not a good thing.

Have them available on the computer and run them as a scan (say) once a week one after the other yes I'd agree with that. If thats what you want then go for counterspy but disable active protection then remove it from your startup folder so it only runs when you want it to.

Oh no. I did not have active protection for Spybot and Ad-Aware.

Oh no. I did not have active protection for Spybot or Ad-Aware. Just ran scans.

If you are running XP, Windows Defender for spyware actually is a decent product, it's free and naturally integrates into Windows well and auto-updates, it's active etc.

I'm not a big fan of Norton stuff anymore, it's rather invasive and boated and slow, like the Canadian government.....