You're asking for a judgement call, almost a prophecy about the
probability of future events.  You're going to get different answers.

I'm assuming that you're using some version of Windows 9x, which
is both more sensitive to problems caused by programs running in
the background and less likely to 'attract' attacks than the NT
series, since it's never used as a server.  I would say the
ZoneAlarm or another firewall is not necessary.  As to Adaware, it
depends on how often you download adware, how careful you are
about the adware and other problematical software you do
download, whether you ever view problematical websites, etc.  If
you don't download a lot of problem-ware, and you never look at
porn, stealware, or pop music sites, I would say don't worry about
that either.

In any case, most spyware is a lot less harmful than a lot of people
think.  I really don't care if RealNetworks has my MAC address
filed away somewhere, or if they could in principle know where I've
downloaded software from.  I'm not important enough to have
secrets which would interest them.

Good luck.
David Jonathan Justman

On 17 Jan 2002, at 6:26, Jagpal S.Tiwana wrote:

> How Zone Alarm or Adware  can help me
> I have dialup connection. I do not stay online all the time, only
> about  two hours in a day and my computer  does not stay on for more than
> three hours at a time. I close it when I m done.
>
> No harm has come my way for the last ten years.  May I know if I am
> vulnerable to a security risk

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