Since the advent of e-mail, instant messengers and social networking websites it has become a lot easier for people to chat and stay in touch across any distance. These advances have been herald as a golden age in communication and rightly so, there are however, some down sides. If abused it allows for even greater covert communication or means for dangerous individuals to contact vulnerable people.

For the D.I.Y. Detective there are a whole host of means for PC Monitoring to combat a wide range of issues. For the most basic approach to PC Monitoring there are a range of physical, in-line Keyloggers for both USB and PS/2 keyboards. These units need to be connected to the end of the keyboard wire and then connected up to the back of the PC, the unit then records every key stroke entered into the keyboard. Once the unit has been retrieved it can be connected up to another PC and a report printed off.

Where something physical can’t be left in the PC, or its a Laptop, Keylogging software is also available loaded onto a discrete USB fash drive. Simply plug the flash drive into the PC or laptop, whilst logged in as an administrator, run the 60 second installation, remove the flash drive and walk away. The software then sits, hidden on the target’s PC recording every key stroke entered along with periodic screen shots. The information is then recovered by plugging the flash drive back into the targeted PC and downloading the data file for review in a different location.

Along with surveillance, there are also parental monitoring applications available with Software based PC Monitoring. This allows parents to monitor use of the the Internet, restrict Internet usage times, decipher instant messenger talk (lol = laugh out loud) and much more. The software is easy and simple to install and allows parents complete control and protection for their kids using the Internet.

So as you see, the D.I.Y. Detective has quite a few options at his/her fingertips for covert computer monitoring, internet protection and computer protection.

Spy Equipment UK have just announced the release of their latest Computer Surveillance product. The ‘next generation’ in Keyloggers, the Spy Cobra is used in a completely different way to the traditional keyloggers that have been around for a number of years now.

The traditional units are inserted between the keyboard wire and the base unit of a PC. The traditional Keystroke Loggers would record every key that was typed on the keyboard on which it was installed. The information would be retained on the internal ‘flash drive’ memory. These units have restrictions - They cannot be used on wireless keyboards, they cannot be used on Laptop Computers, they are not configured for Windows Vista and the Keylogger had to be left in-line and therefore was open to discovery.

The Spy Cobra unit works in a different way. It is essentially a USB stick with a flash memory and integrated software program. The software takes less than a minute to install and configure and the unit does not have to be left in the PC. Keystrokes and screenshots are stored in a stealth file on the PC being monitored. When returning to the PC being monitored, the Spy Cobra is inserted again and the information from the stealth file is then transferred from the PC onto the Spy Cobra. The information can be reviewed at leisure on a separate PC. In short, the new Spy Cobra takes Keylogging to the next stage, without any of the pitfalls of traditional keyloggers.

This unit is the perfect, affordable, tool for Parents to ‘keep an eye on’ their childrens’ Internet activity and for Employers to monitor employees who are misusing company Computers.