14 DAY TRIAL // Privacy has always been supported and protected by law. However, in the case of computers privacy is pretty difficult to achieve. If you do not physically see someone looking through your computer this does not mean that nobody sees what you do.
Malware is all over the place on the Internet. Out of all the "net pests" that there are out there, spyware is for me the worst kind. Viruses are relatively easy to find and to report. But spyware just doesn't give up. For some of us the problem is solved easily. Most of us use anti-spyware software in order to protect ourselves against unwanted and sometimes harmful visitors.
McAfee has thought of a solution concerning those nasty spyware pests: McAfee AntiSpyware. The archived installation file takes only 7.33MB of your disk space. Together with installing the anti-spyware, McAfee will also add the McAfee Security Center tool which will show you the security index (whether you have installed or not on your computer anti-virus, anti-hacker, anti-abuse or anti-spam softwares).
But let's stick to our business. The interface of McAfee AntiSpyware is user friendly and should not give you any headaches while using it. On the left side of the application window there are the options of the software. The first one is Summary.
Here, the program will show you the current status (if auto-protection is enabled, date and time of the last scan and the scheduled scan, the monitoring). In the right side of the Summary window there are displayed the Last Scan Results with scanned processes, registry keys and files and detected programs, components and cookies. Right below, there is the Common Tasks that enables the user to restore programs, view recent events and erase the tracks.
The second option is Scan. The user can set the application to perform a thorough scan which is a complete scan of the computer or s/he can choose the custom scan option that allows customizing. Thus, you can choose the drives to scan and select the Detect tracking cookies option (in order to maintain your privacy).
The Monitor section permits customizing the level for all monitors (Browser, Windows, Network, Web Browser Hijack and Startup Items) by dragging the slider up and down (High, Medium, Low and Off). Or you can customize each monitor by yourself by setting one of the three actions available (alert me of changes, only log changes and disable this monitor).
After the scan, the user can add some programs to the Trusted Programs vault which can be managed in the Options section. The user can anonymously send program tracking information to the World Virus Map. All you have to do is accept the participation and fill in the required fields (if you are located outside USA you just have to type in the country name). The feature will help McAfee include the information in the tracking of worldwide infection rates.
Configuring the software to begin scanning your computer for unwanted items is easy. Go in Options and select the Scheduled Scan. You can schedule the task daily, weekly, monthly, etc. and you can also select the time for the scan. In Advanced, the user can set a start date and an end date together with specifying the recurrence of the task (every couple of minutes or hours) and its duration.
If you have accidentally removed a program that you know for sure that is not a malware, you can always go to the Tools in Options and restore it. The Erase My Tracks feature will remove all the information that was collected while browsing the Internet. Of course, the user can select the tracks that s/he wants erased (tracking cookies, cache or history).
The Event Log will record all the changes that have been made while using McAfee AntiSpyware: on demand scans, removed programs, monitor status change, startup item change, etc., together with the date and time of the changes. The log files can be exported as .doc file format for later reading or they can be erased.
The Good
The Automatic protection feature will alert you the moment a known spyware, Trojan, dialer, persistent and unwanted Internet marketing, or other potentially unwanted program is created.
The software found some known rotten cookies on my computer which were successfully removed.
The Bad
The software runs OK but the Security Center application that comes with it is a bit crazy as it detected no anti-virus software on my machine while it was scanning. I guess the application is subjective in detecting other protecting softwares than McAfee's.
Another problem I found is that after removing the malicious items detected by the application, they were not removed from my computer and at later scannings they would reappear. It happened to me with two types of cookies.
The Truth
The software is easy to manage and has useful features that will enable the user to keep the computer protected against malware. But the truth is that in some cases, after scanning with McAfee you will have to remove the items manually as the software can't clean them all.
Here are some snapshots of the application in action:
