Yep. I also remember when using a separate application for "adware" was actually necessary, and even the people writing viruses and adware/spyware still made a distinction between the two. Now most stuff finds both because the lines have been erased.


Could be. Also, the hosts file could have been changed. Some antivirus tools will check for that (like HiJack This if it has administrative permissions), or you could go edit it manually to make sure it hasn't been changed. [url=Here]Here[/url] are the locations.


Windows 7 started installing Microsoft Security Essentials with Windows Update a good long while after the OS was first released. At least, that's what I've seen anecdotally. But I'm pretty sure it'll only install if you don't already have an antivirus installed. It certainly won't enable it as a second antivirus, which would be bad.[/quote]


It's a little more amorphous. Defender has been built into Windows since XP, and is a separate program from MSE. When you install MSE, Defender is disabled. It is in fact an antivirus program, though, so I'm a little unclear what the differences between it and MSE are, aside from the addition of scheduled virus scans...

Also, in my research to confirm the above info, I was surprised to see I was wrong about something I keep telling my clients. I thought MSE was the former Giant Antispyware. Turns out that Defender is. I have no idea where MSE came from. Maybe they built it in-house? Maybe with the Giant team?