In the last couple of years, spyware has become more fearful than the viruses and other security penetrating malware. The attacks have intensified and the aim is purely economical. Spying applications are all over the Internet and whether they are "eavesdropping" at your accounts and passwords or simply tracking the places you go on the Internet they are equally harmful. They attack your privacy and steal personal information.

I once read somewhere on the Internet a phrase that said that no computer protection can be called the best as malware and malicious activities will always exist. That is absolutely true and a good anti spyware, firewall or anti virus has to detect and eliminate as many threats as possible. But there is no such application that will protect your computer 100% against any form of malicious items.

Spyware Defender is not issued to prove this theory wrong, it is just another tool that strives to keep your computer as clean as possible. It dos not change the standards and will simply offer some sort of protection against spyware that reside on your computer. The price is $25.95 and the developer makes available an evaluation version. Unfortunately, the limitation imposed for the shareware version prevents you from fully testing the software. You cannot perform a single elimination or send a single item to quarantine. Other than this, everything works fine.

The interface is nicely built, the options running down in the left side of the application window. The user friendly advantage of the interface allows every type of user easy management.

Before jumping to performing a scan of the computer you should take a look in the application Options and properly configure the program in order to suit your needs. This location allows setting the action of the Scan button in the main screen (quick scan, full scan or custom scan). Also, depending on your computer's performance, you can make a very good compromise between the speed of the scan and the CPU power required. The principle is simple: the more CPU is used the faster the scan.

There are several locations to be checked by Spyware Defender when a quick scan is performed: the memory object, registry, cookies, compressed files and system restore files. If there are several accounts on the computer, then you can configure the application to scan all the accounts available. This way you can be sure that all the other computer users will have no malicious items. For continuous protection Spyware Defender can be set to start with the operating system and monitor the activity at background level.

As for the scan related options, these are the basic ones that fulfill the basic needs of the user. There is no scheduling possibility nor a real-time protection feature. So all the scans have to be done manually. System Status section displays the definition statistics, scan time, upgrade time, spyware detected and information about the version of the software and license. System Scan comprises the three types of scan provided by Spyware Defender: Quick Scan, Full Scan and Custom Scan. The Message Center in the right hand of the window reveals the actions of each type of scan by simply hovering your mouse over the option.

Quarantine options allow the user to restore the selected item or permanently delete it. During the test only cookies were detected as malicious content on my computer but being a trial version of the software there was no way to send the items to quarantine. However, the Spyware information will provide in some cases quite rich information on the detected items (name of the malware, type, risk level, creator, website and a brief description).

Logs of the scans are recorded and the section that supplies such details is Histories. You can find out the type of the scan, number of spyware found on your machine, number of scanned and infected files, how many of them have been removed, date, time and duration of the scan. Histories also gives you the log of the spyware that has been removed from your computer as well as the location it resided in.

The last option sported by Spyware Defender is AntiSpyware Tools. It comprises a set of four tools that help the user in managing the autorun processes, hosts file, BHO (Browser Helper Object and immunize your computer against ActiveX malicious items). Unless you have the key to register Spyware Defender, there is nothing you can do in here.

The Good

The interface is user friendly and every option is in plain view. My favorite feature is the Message Center that provides good information on some malicious items detected on your computer and about the options sported by the application.

The Bad

Putting into balance the price and the features and options of the application you do not have to be an expert to see that the price tag should have a lower price. You don't even have a scheduling option (I detected no process running in the background and belonging to Spyware Defender), not to mention that a proper testing before buying the software cannot be performed, unless you find a cracked version somewhere on the Internet.

The Truth

A spyware eliminating tool should give the user the chance to test it and eliminate at least a limited number of malware. I could never buy a software just because the developer brags about eliminating the biggest nasties ever created and take his word for it.

Besides, applications like Spybot - Search and Destroy are free and much acclaimed. Why would someone want to spend $25 just because the interface is nice and easy to use? Anyway, try it for yourself and decide accordingly.

Here are some snapshots of the application in action: