I have to disagree with you Wong. The I-net is not becoming a dangerous place. Its just that, there is a degree of knowledge one must have in order to use it properly. Just like a car, you have to check the oil, gas, coolant etc.. Your computer is the same way.
Personally, I wish they would make you get a license in order to purchase a computer. The reason these worms work so well is because of the vast ammount of un-protected computers. You see, this is how blaster worked. Your computer would get infected, the worm would then make your computer send it out blindly trying to affect someone elses pc. Now when you put that on a scale of millions of pc's (Simply because people where not aware how to protect themselves)
As for spyware, once again you have to either INSTALL IT YOURSELF (they can be sneaky nice guys here, when you install certain proggies like Kazaa it also installs a adware program called Gator) also clicking on certain pop-ups can install spy/adware. The other way is for your browser settings to be to lax. Very small programs can slip in as cookies. This doesn't mean you have to disable all cookies. For most of you, just set your browser to medium security and you will be fine.