Since buying my first home PC in 1996 (and shortly after getting my first computer virus), I have long been an advocate of protecting your PC with the best available software. Although I am not a computer genius, I have educated myself extensively on the topics of viruses, spyware, and malware. In general, you could call me a PC Security nut. I tend to only install the very best security software on my machines.

Up until recently, Spyware Doctor by PC Tools was my antispyware product of choice. It will not only detect and remove most spyware from your system, it will also prevent your PC from getting infected in the first place. Prevention is key. I have tried a number of other antispyware products including Adaware, Aluria, A-Squared, Counterspy, Ewido (now called AVG) , Microsoft Windows Defender, Spybot Search & Destroy, Spysweeper and Supersantispyware. Spyware Doctor is on par with the best in terms of prevention, detection, and removal of spyware.

Why do I say that?

1. It is easy to use. No matter how good of protection a product provides, if it is not user friendly, the end user is not going to use it. Spyware Doctor has a clean interface, is laid out logically, and is very easy to install and use.

2. It is Effective at detection/removal. What good is an antispyware product that can't detect the spyware on your machine or remove the spyware it detects? In on-line test after test, Spyware Doctor is consistently rated among the best at detecting and removing spyware. No product will detect and remove everything, but Spyware Doctor is often rated tops in this department, and always in the top two or three (along with Spy Sweeper).

3. It is effective at prevention. An ounce of prevention truly is worth a pound of cure. As new spyware is created every day, antispyware programs keep getting bigger and bigger, needing more and more definitions in order to detect spyware that is on your system. Every day spyware gets harder to detect. Life would be so much easier if you could simply keep the spyware off your machine in the first place. That is what Spyware Doctor accomplishes through its real-time protection which PC Tools calls OnGuard. Spyware Doctor has guards to protect you from all different types of spyware from trojans to browser helper objects, to malicious cookies and keystroke loggers. More detail on this below.

4. It doesn't use too many system resources. A security product that makes your PC as secure as Fort Knox is not functional if it hogs too many of your system resources. Too many products are turning into what I call bloatware. The best designed products do their job both effectively and efficiently. This is particularly important if you happen to have an older PC or even a machine that is only a few years old that is just starting to slow down. Spyware Doctor is not a small program, but not too taxing on the system either.

Now, onto the specifics as to why Spyware Doctor is so effective. Spyware Doctor uses a series of real time protections called guards that prevent spyware from getting on your PC. Those guards are:

Cookie Guard: Monitors your system from potential malicious cookies

Startup Guard: Monitors and removes new malicious files which try to run automautically at system startup on your system.

Exploit Guard: Protects your PC from Windows Metafile Vulnerability.

Browser Guard: Protects your browser settings and prevents bowser hijacks

IM Guard: Protects your instant messaging sessions and blocks incoming and outgoing text referencing known bad sites.

Immunizer: Prevents known Active X threats from getting on your system

Keylogger Guard: Prevents keystroke loggers from working

Network Guard: Prevents malicious changes to your network settings

Popup Blocker: Prevents unwanted popup ads that may appear while surfing the Internet

Process Guard: Kills spyware processes, prevents them from running. So even if spyware somehow gets through to your sytem, process guard prevents them from launching. It can even detect hidden processes.

Site Guard: Prevents access to known malicious websites, phishing sites, or sites that are known to distribute spyware or steal your personal information

Scheduler: Allows you to schedule automatic system scans as well as auto updates.


As you can see, the guards provide a high level of protection and that protection is highly customizable. Many of the guards give you multiple setting options and all of them can be turned on or off depending on the level of protection you want. Additionally, you can tell it how thoroughly to scan your computer, opting for a full scan, a quick scan, or a custom scan. The full scan scans every file on your computer, the quick scan scans only files that are typically targeted by malware, and the custom scan scans whatever you tell it to.

All in all, a solid and comprehensive offering from PC Tools at a reasonable. I paid $29.95 for a one year license including tech support and free updates. I am also able to install that license on up to 3 PC's in my home, something other companies charge extra for.

All that said, no antispyware product is perfect. Spyware Doctor definitely has some issues which caused me to remove it from my PC. One annoying trait is the delay of your start up. Spyware Doctor will cause your computer to take an extra 2-3 minutes to boot up. If you reboot frequently, this can be a major annoyance. The update feature has an annoying tendency as well. After update, the program must turn itself off and restarts. This process takes about 2-3 minutes and while it does this, it can be difficult to do anything else on the computer. This is easily resolved if you simply schedule the program to update at a time when you are not at your PC, but a nuisance nonetheless. The program also is a little too aggressive in detecting spyware and often labels harmless files on your computer as spyware. This is called a "false positive". In the last 2 months it has given me 2 false positives. The last time it labeled my Antivirus Program as spyware and disabled it. This was very alarming. On top of that, by default, the program also installs the google toolbar on your computer and places an advetisement in your skype, advertising itself. These last 2 issues could be viewed as instances of adware, the exact thing the program is designed to prevent.

With the above mentioned drawbacks, I cannot recommend this product. Though it does a wonderful job at detecting, removing, and preventing spyware, the drawbacks are too big to overlook. When an antispyware application places advertisements on your PC and attacks your antivirus program, it is time to look elsewhere. With some work, this program could be the best in class. But as is, it needs further development.

Recommended: No