Using Microsoft AntiSpyware Beta1

Microsoft AntiSpyware actually enables you to do more than just find and destroy spyware.

It also enables you to see what processes or files may be hijacking your webbrowser and end them.

In addition it easily lets you clear many history lists from your computer.

History lists can hog computer memory.

If you do not yet have Microsoft AntiSpyware installed on your computer,

I suggest that you visit http://www.drennon.org/updates/mas

Assuming that you now have Microsoft AntiSpyware installed on your Windows 2000

or Windows XP computer,

(Other operating systems are not compatible with this software), you may now begin to use it.

If you configured your software like it was suggested at http://www.drennon.org/updates/mas

then the software will be automatically updated and will check for spyware every night (early morning)

while keeping guard over your browser during the day.

However, it is good to check on the software to make sure it is doing its job.

You can also do other useful functions with it manually.

First click on the MAS icon on your desktop:

From the first screen that opens, you can check to see if the program ran recently,

when it was last checked, and what it found:

If you feel that your computer is running sluggishly and fear that the problem may be spyware,

you can run the program automatically anytime by clicking on the blue arrow:

The scan will begin running when you see this screen. Wait:

When the scan is completed, you will see a screen like this with the number of threats discovered in RED:

Click to view results. The following screen will appear:

Select to REMOVE all of the processes. However, please note that if it should find Slim FTPd, to tag it with

“ALWAYS IGNORE”. Slim FTPd is NOT spyware. We use it on our LAN to facilitate FTP transfers.

FTP transfers to and from your computer from outside our LAN is firewalled. Thus do NOT remove SlimFTP.

Once you have selected to always ignore it, you should not see it again.

There are other options you may wish to explore!

You may wish to select ADVANCED TOOLS from the opening window or from the upper corner of later windows:

You will see the following screen. You have the option of selecting between System Explorere,

Browser Hijack Restore, or Tracks Eraser. In this example we will select TRACKS ERASER:

You will see a list of possible software that keeps track of your history. This history record can be exploited by

Websites that you visit. The history record also takes up computer memory.

EXAMPLE USE OF ERASE TRACKS:

In this example, you may visit a

website that is interested in your google searches so that it can make pop-ups that might exploit your interests.

Thus, it might be good to clear the history of your google history. It use to be that you would have to do some

Complicated manual removals in your registry.

Now all you have to do is select the GOOGLE TOOLBAR HISTORY by placing a check in the checkbox

and clicking ERASE TRACKS:

You will then see the following confirmation box:

Confirm by clicking on the YES button.

The Google search history will be erased and you will you see another confirmation box:

Click OK to finish.

You can erase your history on almost any software you use on your computer. Doing this periodically will

help protect your privacy and clear computer memory!

You can also select System Explorers:

You will see the following window:

On the left you will see a list of system explorers that show plug-ins to your web browser. You can select

any of these with a click of your mouse and determine what plug-ins are there. Every plug-in slows down

your computing. Although you should keep important and neccessay plug-ins, you may wish to remove

Those plug-ins that a website made for you that you do not want or use.

Example of System Explorers

Lets select IE toolbars in this example: We click on “IE Toolbars”

We then see a list of the MSIE toolbars on our MSIE browser window:

In this case our only toolbars are &Google… which has no problems and which we want because it is an

Excellent pop-up blocker and @msdxm which needs to be there for any toolbar to work. So in this case, we

Remove nothing. HOWEVER, if we find other toolbars (such as Juno or Yahoo! or AIM or whatever, they

can be used by hackers and take up a lot of computer resources, so we would remove them. We would remove

unwanted toolbars by highlighting the toolbar and clicking to PERMANENTLY REMOVE THIS TOOLBAR:

The tool bar would be removed after we confirm in the confirmation boxes that would appear.

Another advanced feature is

When you click on BROWSER HIJACK RESTORE, you get the following window:

At CVC we keep our web browser with the above settings. Note that http://www.cvc.org is our start page.

We do NOT use Juno or MSNBC as our start page. Those pages can change settings on your computer..

Especially since they give space to advertisers who can do whatever they want to .

The website http://www.cvc.org has no mischievous plug-ins or setting changes to make.

KEEP your home page at http://www.cvc.org

Hopefully, this helps you with using AntiSpyware Beta 1 from Microsoft.

-- Bill Drennon, director of Technology, CVC