Difference between Spyware and Trojans

The term "Trojan Horse" is frequently confused with Spyware. Some vendors say: Our software detects Ad-Trojans. Here you must distinguish between Ad-Trojans and classic Trojans.

Ad-Trojans are not harmful. They only install themselves on the target computer without letting the user know, to create a surfing profile. But they are not harmful. The main idea behind Ad-Trojans is to show the user personalized ads, matching the user's interests.

Classic Trojans are mostly Backdoors which opens the computer for others. They allow full remote administration of the PC. An attacker is able to watch you while you are surfing the web, log your keyboard input with a keylogger, view your monitor's content, use your microphone to hear what you are saying and also use your webcam (if available) to watch what you are doing in fron of the PC. Backdoor Trojans are really harmful. Not only because anyone can steal personal documents and files from your machine. The real danger is the fact, that your computer can also be misused by spammers to send millions of emails or can also be misused to act like a filesharing server for illegal files and porn.

So if you are searching for a Spyware scanner software, ensure to have also a real Trojan Horse protection running on your computer system. Programs like Ad-aware or SpyBot don't protect you from most Backdoor Trojans.