Ah yes, the semi-regular reminder to folks that, for your own sake and the sake of your loved ones, you need to use protection.

Sure, I admit that there was a time when I too engaged in unprotected Internet, but those days are long behind me; I’ve been tested hundreds of times since then, I’m clean, and I use protection now.

I mean, c’mon: it’s not that hard, it doesn’t “ruin the experience,” and heck, if you’re really strapped for cash, there are even places that give it away for free.

Do it for yourself. Do it for your family…

…do it so I don’t come over to your house and choke your dumb ass for sending me infected files.

P.S.: For those of you with voyeur problems as well, I recommend the $30 expense of SpyHunter.

I use a combo of AdAware and SpyBot, both free (and I'm liking the Open Source SpyBot quite a bit -- I need to put it onto Margie's machine).

Hey Dave, I used to use AdAware too, then I started using the stuff we use at work (Best Buy). AdAware picked up 24 instances of spyware on a particular machine, this other stuff (yeah, it'd be nice if I remembered the name, but that'd make it too easy) picked up over 800. It not only has better .dat file updates, it does a better registry and file scan. Ask at the tech bay at any Best Buy. Oh, and we used this stuff to scan an out-of-the-box HP just to see what'd happen. Found over 1,500 instances of spyware. Nice, huh.

Too many companies are making too much money bundling spyware with their systems.

SpyBot catches a lot more than AdAware does, and more actively protects systems than the free version of AA does (I get a warning when something changes in certain registry keys or startup folders).