SpywareBlaster

[Noreen]

This was posted in another forum in a thread discussing whether this program is worth installing.

It's the wrong approach. Basically:

1) It's abusing mechanisms that were never meant to have thousands of entries. The killbits are just meant to prevent a few known bad controls. The restricted sites zone is not meant to block tens of thousands of sites. They are just junking up those registry keys.

2) It's ineffective. They can't prevent malware by blocking GUIDs of known activex controls and adding domains to restricted sites. That's just a drop in the bucket. If I was writing a control, every revision would have a new GUID. Domains are registered at random for malware redirections and stuff. Numeric addresses are often used too.

I don't understand enough to have an opinion but what do you think?

[Simon]

I think it's outdated now, Noreen, and there is more effective protection available, such as SuperAntiSpyware.

[Rik]

Agreed.

[Noreen]

Oh well, I've got SuperAntiSpyware too although only the free version which isn't running all the time.

[Rik]

I just scan once in a while, Noreen. I've never found anything.

[Baz]

I have Spywareblaster it just sits there, running in the background or so they say, but I will say that I rarely have bother so maybe it does work ok.

[D-Dan]

My own testing over on TSA didn't find SpywareBlaster to be particularly effective these days. IMO all you need is a decent AV, SAS free (though I have the paid version) and MBAM. Between them, they will clean pretty much anything you may pickup.

I don't specialise in AV, but I find Avast to be competent.

Steve

Edited to add links