You can do IT is a regular feature of laterlife.com aimed at trying to help laterlife visitors make the most of Information Technology on or off the web.     

Jackie Sherman who runs the You can do IT Question & Answer section is an IT trainer and author. Jackie has spent her career in education and specialises in teaching IT to adults. Her courses for adults include such topics as MS Office, the Internet, e-mail and basic web page authoring.  

Jackie has also written the four books shown here - you can find more details about these by clicking on the cover images above. Jackie has also been running a course specifically for over 50s. 

Via laterlife.com Jackie aims to particularly help those new to IT and the web to build up knowledge and confidence, so no question is too basic. At the same time she will cover Q&As for the more experienced user. 

So if you would like to ask a question of Jackie, why not email her jackie@laterlife.com

or if you have discovered something which may be of interest to others in making the most of the web, then she would love to hear about that too jackie@laterlife.com

October 2008

This month I am going to explain how to stop your computer becoming cluttered up with spyware programs.

What is spyware?

This is the general name for programs that are downloaded surreptitiously as you surf the Web and which secretly gather information about you and what you do on the internet.  Although not aimed specifically at harming your computer, unlike viruses, spyware is definitely unwanted as it not only monitors your activity, it can also change computer settings, redirect your browser and otherwise interfere with how you work.

There are many free anti-spyware programs that you can install, and as long as you download a genuine version, keep them updated and run them regularly, they will remove all known spyware.  Examples of such programs include Google's Spy Doctor, STOPzilla, AVG Anti-Spyware and Spybot.  A good download site for Spybot is http://www.safer-networking.org.

Updating your program

• Open the program from the icon on your taskbar or any other link that you have.
• Click the Update button.

• You can now download all the new programs that have been identified by clicking the Download Updates button.   They will be listed in the main window and each one will be downloaded in turn.  A green tick will appear next to the programs that have been downloaded.

• You will now have a database of new spyware programs that have been written since your last check, and running a computer scan will identify and remove any that have been installed on your machine.

Running the scan

1. After updating, click the Search & Destroy button.  The program will check for any Spyware programs.  

1. These will be listed in red in the main window.  It takes some time for all of them to be found, so you need to be patient.

1. When the scan has finished, click the Fix selected problems button at the top of the screen and the spyware will be removed.  You may  first need to click into every box next to a program name to place a tick there.

1. You can now close the program and run a new scan in a few days.

View previous editions of YoucandoIT for more useful Questions and Answers
 

For a wealth of books on the web and IT generally, visit Amazon and under the books section select Computers and Internet.

Don't forget to visit the general laterlife features section called laterlife interest