Spyware is a problem that has grown during the last few years. It is nowadays difficult to spend some time online without being victm of some kind of spyware embedded on applications.

The question, however, is how can we prevent and avoid the trouble with spyware. Here are some tips that I believe are very helpful in controlling spyware on personal computers.

The Internet gives us the opportunity of finding thousands of programs for free. This means that we can be more productive and spend less money with software.

Like most things that are free, however, there are some problems. First, make sure that you trust the origin of the program. Don't just install any program that you find in the web without knowing what company wrote the program, and who is behind it. Do you research, and try to find other people that used the software.

A number of software databases exist nowadays with information about programs. You can use these databases to check if the program you are considering has some kind of spyware of adware.

A way to find this information is search in Google for the name of your program followed by "adware or spyware". You will see a number of web sites that have researched the application and tell if it is "adware free" or "spyware free".

Several adware prevention applications are available on the market. Some are free, but most of the good ones can be bought inexpensively on web sites. Just look in the Internet for adware software and you will find lots of options. Here are some of the programs that I have used and have been very reliable in my opinion:

• Spybot search and destroy: a free program that is very well regarded.
• Adware alert: a very up to date solution for adware removal that has been successfully used by several people.
• Ad-Aware - lavasoft: this was one of the first programs available to solve this problem.
• No-adware.net: a software that has a web-based resource that keeps the adware database constantly updated. A good option in the fight agains adware.