First off, one of the most common spyware programs that people get is called about:blank. You will know when you have this as your IE browser will begin pointing to about:blank no matter what you do.
As mentioned earlier, one of the best ways to prevent spyware, is to be familiar with your program startup list. These include the programs that run whenever your pc is shutdown or rebooted. Since viruses or spyware need a way to begin running again, they put entries in your startup list so they can restart when you reboot. Click Start-Run and type “msconfig” in the box and hit enter. Click the startup tab to view your startup list. These are all the programs that run whenever your pc is rebooted. Become familiar with this, it can save you alot of trouble in the long run. Most people run spyware removers, but spyware changes so quickly that its difficult for any one program to find all of them, so you need to take it to the source. Monitor your startup list and become familiar with it, this will allow you to remove spyware and reboot so it cannot startup again. I would also switch to a browser that does not allow activex, like Netscape. It is free, fast, and you can download it at the Netscape website.

Some spyware/adware/malware arrive as a hidden “add on” when you install free software “gimmies”. Remember that free software (called freeware, freeware is different from shareware, as shareware usually costs money after a free trial period ends and includes full support, while freeware is always free and normally has no support or limited support). Normally freeware is free for a reason. Most companies will not spend all their time supporting and writing something to give away free, unless they have a way to get some money in return (can’t blame them, it makes business sense), so they get paid to embed hidden programs in with your freeware. These programs (called spyware or adware) track you, display ads to you, create pop up windows, or use your machine resources, among other things. The best thing you can do is become familiar with programs that run in your task list, and become familiar with programs that run when you reboot your computer, as all spyware/adware/malware need a way to reactive in case you shutdown. This will always lead you to the source of your popup windows, or advertising popups that are being caused from adware or spyware. You may also want to use a program like Disk and Registry Alert, which allows you to track changes to your drive or registry. Note also if you want to know what all those tasks are showing in your ctrl-alt-del task list, view the computer task list directory here.