File-sharing programs have become increasingly popular among computer users who enjoy downloading music and other multi-media content. However, some of the popular file-sharing programs, including Kazaa, Morpheus, Limewire, and Bearshare, install hidden programs without your knowledge that can cause various problems with your computer. There are two main categories of these hidden programs: spy-ware and ad-ware.

Spy-ware is software that keeps track of everything you do on the Internet, and then reports all of this behavior (along with information about things like how long it took you to get to each web site, how long you stayed there, etc.) back to a main computer. Not only does this violate your privacy on the Internet, but it also creates a lot of additional traffic across your Internet connection, and often makes web browsing and other online activities much slower than normal.

Ad-ware is additional software that causes you to get more annoying pop-up and pop-under advertisements than normal.

To learn more about the malicious things that these file-sharing programs are doing, read some of the following articles:

What you should do

First, we recommend that you un-install your existing copy of Kazaa, Morpheus, Limewire or Bearshare as soon as possible.

  1. Go to your Start menu, then select to Settings -> Control Panel -> Add/Remove Programs.
  2. Select the software you want to remove from the list, and then click Remove.
  3. Once you have removed the software, you should reboot your computer.

Then, we recommend running a program called Ad-aware by Lavasoft. This is a free program that will scan your hard drive (like an anti-virus program) to detect and remove any malicious ad-ware or spy-ware files.

To install Ad-aware:

  1. Download Ad-aware from the link below: http://download.com.com/3002-2144-10214379.html
    If the above link does not work, go to http://download.com.com, and search for "Ad-aware" (no quotes).
  2. Double-click on the Ad-aware installation file that you downloaded (aaw6.exe).
  3. Follow the prompts to install Ad-aware on your computer.

To run Ad-aware:

  1. Open Ad-aware, and then click Check for updates now in the bottom right corner of the window.
  2. Follow the prompts to connect to the update server and download the latest reference file.
  3. Click Scan Now, and then click Next to accept the default settings and begin the scan.
  4. When the scan completes, click Next. Right-click on the list of ad software and files found, and choose Select All Objects.
  5. Click Next to remove the files from your computer. Click OK when it prompts you to confirm.
  6. Once the files have been deleted, you can close Ad-aware.

We recommend that you run Ad-aware on a regular basis, between 1-2 times per month.

Finally, if you want to continue using file-sharing software, download and install a safer program.

  • You can find out a lot of information about these programs from Zeropaid.com, including which ones do or don't include spy-ware or ad-ware.
  • We recommend Gnucleus, Shareaza, or Xolox.

Contact Krohnert.net Consulting if you have any questions or problems.



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