Spyware can and often does mean that other data from your computer is taken. For example, html code can take your icq number, your email address, etc. If you have spyware on your machine and wonder why you're getting spam, well, wonder no more. There was a time when credit card numbers were easily obtained by packet interception and spyware. One such program is webshots which loads gator and offer companion. Its hard to clean off the system and requires a specific removal sequence. I banned webshots at the office and some of the employees continued to disregard. They reloaded after I spent days cleaning the systems. We currently receive approximately 900 spam email a day from the misconduct of two former employees and the ignorant surfing of the boss. On occasion, we don't get our outside emails because of server overload. So, spyware is very damaging and hopefully some day there will be a law about it. But so far, congress has only enacted a law that says if you're going to spam, you have to give removal info. Congress didn't say that the removal info had to work, just that it had to be given. We have a lot of non computer literate politicians out there.