Every year advertising in computer programs becomes more popular. To define it, a separate term was coined - "adware". What is it?
Essentially, this is special software that is installed directly on the user's computer and displays advertisements.
There are online and offline adware programs. What does this mean?
Adware from a developer's point of view
First of all, let's try to understand why software developers embed advertisements in their products in general, and how it happens.
Features of online-adware
In this case, ads are constantly downloaded from some external Internet source. According to the principle of operation, such programs partly resemble ordinary banners on websites. Considering that ads can only be shown if there is an Internet connection, this scheme is used, as a rule, precisely on those programs that are focused on working on the network.
Services for introducing adware into regular programs are offered by specialized advertising networks (for example, Soft. Tbn. Ru). Programmers participating in the network receive from the organizersspecial component SoftTBN.dll, and then integrate it into their programs.
When these programs are launched by users, banners are downloaded from the central database and displayed in the interface. If there is no Internet connection, those banners that were accumulated by the program earlier are displayed.
However, would such an adware program be effective? After all, firstly, the presence of banners in the program almost always annoys users. Secondly, embedding advertising modules increases the number of errors in the program code. In fact, the image of the program suffers, and people begin to look for alternatives, enriching the developers' competitors.
Features of offline-adware
On the other hand, offline-adware programs do not use external sources to display ads. The entire set of banners is initially present in the program code and does not change during the entire period of its use. The Internet is accessed only when the user clicks on the ad.
The behavior of offline-adware is completely under the control of developers, which significantly reduces the number of errors during operation. In addition, programmers can control which ads will be displayed in the program's interface - as a rule, they are of interest to program users and do not contain malicious information. It is much more difficult to crack the code of such programs.
The only downside for developers, perhaps, is the limited set of banners. However, this shortcomingdevelopers compensate by regularly releasing new versions of the program.
If you encounter an adware virus…
Tired as hell of ads popping up in useful and useful programs you use?
How to remove adware virus? The above information shows that adware is not a separate piece of malware, but a component of other software. That is, most modern antiviruses consider that this is a necessary file for the operation of a regular program.
That's why there are special utilities designed to remove adware. What are these programs? The most popular and effective products at the moment are:
- Ad-Adware;
- Spybot – Search &Destroy;
- Spyware Terminator;
- AVZ;
- a-squared Free.
These programs automatically detect and remove adware files. At the same time, the functionality of the program itself does not suffer - you continue to use it, but you do not see annoying banners.
In general, like any other advertising, adware also has its advantages. What does it mean? Typically, ads are targeted - that is, users are shown only those ads that may be of real interest to them. Therefore, before deleting adware files, take a closer look at the ads: maybe you will find exactly what you need?
