Adware is anadvertisingcomputer program that can be put there by other people on someone'scomputer, sometimes without their permission. It iscontroversial because sometimesbusinesses put the program there so they can see what people are doing or whatweb pages they arebrowsing. They then put anadvertisement that is of the samesubject as the web-page the person is looking at. This can be good if the person is trying to buy something, but many people do not want advertisements. Many people also do not want other people to find out what they are doing or what web pages they are looking at. An example is in the popularpeer-to-peerfile sharing program,Kazaa. When someonedownloads it, it installs adware on their computer that then sends advertisements to the computer. Some people do not like this so they use anillegally changedversion of this program calledKazaa Lite.
Removal tools have been developed to assist users in clearing out these unwanted programs.Like many programs that people use forsecurity, the program must be changed often. Updating allows the removal tool to recognize new types of adware. This can be done by downloadingfiles over theinternet using the 'update' option in the program.
