Ad-Aware

Adware is somewhat similar to spyware and collects information about the user’s web browsing habits in order to display advertisements on the user’s computer. The information is tracked, reported, and sometimes sold to other vendors without the consent or knowledge of the user.

A program named Lavasoft Ad-Aware is available to remove adware from your computer. If Ad-Aware is not on your computer, contact your LSP. The following are step-by-step instructions to run Ad-Aware on your computer. Remember to always check for updates and download the recent updates before starting the scan.

1. Locate the Ad-Aware SE Plus icon (not the Ad-Watch SE Plus) on your desktop and double click (may also be found by clicking on Start and then All Programs).

2. A dialogue box will appear telling how many days old your definitions are and asking if you would like to check for updates. Click on OK to check for updates. NOTE: If the dialogue box indicates a newer “version” of Ad-Aware is available, contact your LSP to install the new version.

3. The next box to appear will ask you to connect to the updated site. Click on the button that says “Connect”.

4. Now click on the “OK” button to download and install the files. After the files have been installed, click on the “Finish” button.

5. You are now ready to start a scan of the computer.Click the “Start” button then make sure the radio box named Perform smart system scan is checked and then click on next as indicated below. (The smart scan will usually suffice, but if a computer is really infected, check the box that says “Perform full system scan”)

6. When the scan is complete, it will say Finished under Current Operation, tell how many objects it found, and display a “Next” button as shown below. Click Next.

7. Left click once in each box of the items Ad-Aware found to put a check mark in the box and then click on the Next button. (shown below)

8. The next dialogue box that appears will tell how many objects will be removed and ask if you want to continue. Click on OK.

After the deletion of the files has completed, Ad-Aware has finished removing adware from you computer and you may close out of the program.