by stopping the browser from writing data anywhere except in a temporary files folder without first seeking permission. Lastly, Windows Defender will clean up any infections that do make it through.
"It is three layers of protection," Wilson said.
While this may be good news for buyers of Vista, it is not for anyone who makes a living from selling anti-spyware software. The worldwide market has boomed recently, reaching US$97 million in revenue in 2004, up 240.4 percent from a year earlier, according to IDC. However, companies such as Webroot Software and Sunbelt Software are in for tough times, analysts said.
"The aftermarket for Windows anti-spyware is going to dry up almost completely," said Yankee Group analyst Andrew Jaquith. "Windows Defender is going to become the default anti-spyware engine, certainly for most consumers that have Vista machines."
Gartner's Pescatore agreed. "Integrating Windows Defender into Windows Vista is sort of the last nail into the standalone anti-spyware coffin," he said.
But the anti-spyware market won't disappear overnight. Vista will ship at the end of 2006, and users aren't likely to instantly buy a new PC or upgrade. "You will have a two-to-three-year window before Vista has a major impact on anti-spyware," Pescatore said.
Microsoft is also making security moves outside the anti-spyware space. The Redmond, Wash., company is readying a consumer antivirus product called Windows Live OneCare and enterprise software called Microsoft Client Protection. "The Windows security aftermarket has become too large for Microsoft to ignore it," Jaquith said.
Consumers and small businesses will get their anti-spyware protection mostly from Microsoft and may also opt for the company's antivirus product, analysts predicted. However, larger organizations will look to their trusted antivirus software makers, such as Symantec, McAfee and Trend Micro, for protection, they said.
But not everyone agrees that Vista can make spyware disappear or that its arrival spells the end of the anti-spyware industry. "I think all of these operating system enhancements are going to be helpful in the battle on spyware. I don't think there is a silver bullet, though," said David Moll, chief executive officer of Webroot, the largest standalone anti-spyware seller.
Vista will have an impact, but it won't shut the door on spyware, agreed Alex Eckelberry, president of Sunbelt Software, maker of the CounterSpy tools. There's a huge economic benefit for spyware creators and hackers to continue their practices, he said.
If Vista and Defender don't completely eliminate the threat, then there will always be a market for third party solutions, said Chris Swenson, an analyst at The NPD Group.
"I think Microsoft's new products look excellent, and they will significantly reduce the threat," Swenson said. "But...I'm more of a skeptic about their ability to prevent every single instance of spyware from infiltrating PCs."
The purveyors of spyware will respond to Windows Vista with more sophisticated attacks, Moll said--and that means people will have to be as vigilant in dealing with spyware in the Windows Vista world of the future as they are today.
"It is going to remove the low-hanging fruit. It is going to make it that much harder for dumb spyware to work," Gartner's Pescatore said. "What it will really do is start forcing the threats further up the food chain," he added. Attackers will have to get smarter in fooling the user--what's called social engineering.
Microsoft's Wilson predicts a rise in phishing attacks, which seek to dupe users into giving up personal information by using fraudulent e-mail messages and Web sites. "The profit motive is always there. They are looking for the easiest way they can trick people to getting things on their machines," he said. "We have seen a transition from spyware to phishing."
Play video
There are currently no comments for this post.