Internet Cleanup 5.0
mysmith micro
<my.smithmicro.com/mac/cleanup/index.html>

As much joy as Apple's growing market share brings to investors and Macaholics, it also bring trouble, too. Trouble in the form of malware, spyware and viruses. To help out, Smith Micro. the purveyors of StuffIt, have created Internet Cleanup.

"Hidden surveillance programs can be lurking on your Mac recording what you type, where you browse and even taking snapshots of your screen. Fight back with Internet Cleanup 5.0! Detect, prevent and delete the implements of Internet invasions!?

Sounds like the trailer for a 'B' horror film, but it's becoming more real with each passing session your machine has.

The Juice
Internet Clean up has both tools to tidy up and tools to secure your privacy. As to whether one set was grafted onto another I can't say. But it's a useful collection to be sure.

For starters, there's Web Browser Maintenance.Bookmark Manager will sync all of your browsers into one set of bookmarks, so any browser that you use will have the same collection. a Cookie Finder, Internet File Finder and Web History Finder, which allows you to "selectively edit history in [your] web browser."

Then there's Privacy Protection. This collection of software consists IM Log Cleaner (which could do with a preview drawer ala Transmit so that you can see what it is your about to toss), Secure Delete and Simple File Hider

And finally, System Protection. It prevents others with malcontent and thumb drives, iPods, et al., from taking your files. Net Blockade is as it sounds. And the last two programs deal with searching out disposing of spyware.

The Rind

Nada.

THE PITS

Nada.

SUMMARY
Internet Clean up has both tools to tidy up and tools to secure your privacy. As to whether one set of tools was grafted onto another I can't say.

If you have multiple browsers and/or multiple IMs, this is a steal at $29.99 and will save you lots of time. If you have a single version of these apps, then the only thing that you'll be interested in is the System Protection programs, which at $29.99, is still reasonable.

There's a downloadable demo if you would like to give her a spin.

Macsimum rating: 7 out of 10.
System requirements: Mac OS X 10.4.2 or greater ; 80 MB of free hard disk space; Universal Binary; Test Rig: 1.83 GHz Core 2 Duo MacBook/ 4GB RAM/OS 10.5.2

2008 Frank Petrie