Five Reasons Why I Would Never Remove Malware Manually - And Why Neither Should You!

I often get asked whether you can remove malware manaully from your computer for free. Is it possible to get under the hood of your PC and remove a nasty piece of malware yourself? The answer to that question is a hesitant "yes". With that said, however, I quickly follow that up with "but I would never do that!". This article looks at five reasons why you should invest in a reputable anti-malware tool and why you should avoid giving a hack at it yourself. One: The Registry is a Scary Place If you're a bit of a computer whizz and spend a lot of your time programming and reading code, then this probably doesn't apply to you. For the rest of us less gifted, then this reason is at the top of the list. Normally you would uninstall unwanted programs from your computer using the control panel, right? Malware doesn't make this that easy. To remove malware manually, you need to enter your computer's holiest of holies: the Registry. While the process itself isn't all that difficult, a small mistake can fry your computer Unless you're a programmer-by-day, computer hobbyist by night then mucking about in the Registry is worth avoiding at all costs. Two: What Are You Removing? Even if you've identified the original threat, there may still be huge amounts of malware still left on your PC. For example, Trojans work by carrying other malware threats onto your PC with them, or alternatively downloading them off the Internet without your knowledge. While it's great that you've removed the Trojan, what other malware threats have slipped onto your computer? Simply put, removing multiple malware threats manually can take an incredibly long time, with many malware threats setting up a breadcrumb trail that can be very difficult to follow. Three: Your Time Is Valuable If you've had several malware infections simultaneously, there could be literally hundreds of file modifications, registry keys and registry values that you will need to laboriously locate and remove if you're looking to remove malware manually. While this of course has the advantage of being free, don't forget that your time is money too! For me, the $40.00 that you will need to shell out for an anti-malware tool that will solve your problem in ten minutes flat is by far the more economical option rather than spending your valuable time trying to manually remove malware - the math just doesn't work out. Four: Ongoing Protection Congratulations! You've spent four hours removing a Trojan manually from your PC. You've also identified and removed some adware and a backdoor application, too. But what happens tomorrow when the remnants of the Trojan kick back in and download another malware application onto your PC? How far will your patience stretch? Would you be up for another mini-marathon removing yet another viral threat off your PC?