Nine Ways to Wipe Out Spyware-PC Magazine

Well, PC Magazine just evaluated 9 anti-malware tools, and I thought it all made pretty interesting reading. Though once again, I wonder if I'm living out in the Asteroid Belt, because some of this doesn't agree with my own experience. Specifically, I wonder about Spybot's ranking. I have licenses for both SpySweeper and SpywareDoctor, and I'm just not finding that they are significantly better at detecting and removing junk than Spybot 1.5. Though I agree that Teatimer is best avoided.

So, I just wanted to solicit a little comment and feedback. Are you 4 square behind A Squared? Mad for Malwarebytes Antimalware?

Spybot all the way and when needed an online ewido scan.
Having a license is no guarantee its any good

a-squared wasn't even mentioned... or did I miss it?

Oh and the numpty reported the library update as the immunisation update... I don't think so!!

Nope, Noo, A-Squared wasn't mentioned at all. Yep, Ferrit, I agree that licensed isn't necessarily good, and I don't find either SpySweeper or SpywareDoctor outperforming Spybot 1.5, but I do take them for a spin occasionally for purposes of testing and comparison. The evaluation versions don't remove anything, so you can only test performance by buying them. For a retail customer, I think that is a practice that verges on deceptive marketing, but for my uses, it's acceptable.

Why are things like symantec, McAfree, CA etc not included in this list.

Are these really better or are they just leaving out the major brands?

Specific spyware tools are better... although the big boys are beginning to catch up. The more cynical might say that the big boys use spyware practices so they are not too keen on wiping out spyware of certain sorts. ;)

One man's harmless advert is another man's spyware.

One of the big mysteries to me is just how Rubenking came up with this list. This certainly isn't a very representative sample of the best of what's available, and ignores a lot of software that comes highly recommended. Though he seems to have reasonably thorough finding for-pay software to test.

I prefer Spyware Blaster. It prevents spyware from loading pretty well. And I know the author personally.