How to get rid of spyware?

Spyware and spam are without a doubt the plague of the information age, but fortunately there are some more or less effective (depending on how up to date you keep the software) cures for the former: Ad-aware and Spybot.

Ad-aware can be found at: http://www.lavasoftusa.com/
Spybot at: http://security.kolla.de/

Disclaimer: I am not affiliated with those software developpers and I only give the URL to their websites here because they are totally free of use (except Ad-aware which has a "Pro" version, but you still don't lose any of the functions useful to a home-user on the free package).