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Computer Viruses - Stay Healthy in the New Year
Computer viruses are annoying. If you've ever been infected, you may know what a tremendous amount of aggravation they can cause. The sad part is that most viruses are easily preventable if you take proper precautions and understand the basics of viruses. So to start the new year, here's some information that may help you not become the next virus victim.
What are Viruses, Worms, Trojan Horses, and Hoaxes?
The differences between viruses, worms, and Trojan horses are not really that important... but knowledge is a wonderful thing, impress your friends next time you're at a party.
Ÿ Viruses - A virus is a program that spreads itself to other computers and in some way messes up the computer. Some viruses are pretty innocuous - others can destroy or corrupt data or cause an operating system or application to malfunction.
Ÿ Bombs - A bomb is similar to a virus except that it resides quietly in a computer until it is triggered by a specific condition, such as a date.
Ÿ Worms - A worm is a program that makes copies of itself, for example from one disk drive to another, or by copying itself using email or some other transport mechanism. It may do damage and compromise the security of the computer. It may arrive in the form of a joke program or software of some sort.
Ÿ Trojan Horses - A Trojan horse is a program that neither replicates or copies itself, but does damage or compromises the security of the computer. Typically it relies on someone emailing it to you, it does not email itself, it may arrive in the form of a joke program or software of some sort.
Ÿ Hoaxes - Hoaxes arrive in an email that gets mailed in chain letter fashion describing something too good to be true... or something too bad to be true -- like some devastating highly unlikely type of virus. You can usually spot a hoax because there's no link to a third party who can validate the claim and the general 'tone' of the message (urging you to forward it to everyone). Forwarding bogus email and hoaxes costs time and money, and slows down the Internet for everyone. They also reflect poorly on the sender. Read more about hoaxes at http://antivirus.about.com/library/weekly/aa102300a.htm.
How are Viruses Transferred? (and how to keep them off your machine)
Understanding how viruses spread is the key to keeping them off your system. Computer viruses are transferred in the following ways:
Ÿ Floppy Disks - Viruses can be lurking on disks you get from friends or coworkers. It's always best to scan any disk you put into your computer with anti-virus software. I have links to some anti-virus applications at the bottom of this article -- including one that's completely free.
Ÿ The Internet - It's highly unlikely that you'll contract a virus by simply browsing the Internet. So don't let that be high on your list of worries (but it is a good idea to stay current with the latest patches and upgrades to your browser). Not even downloading files from the Internet will cause you to get a computer virus. Installing and running it is where the problems lies. When possible download your software directly from the vendor (for example asksam.com) or use the major download sites (for example download.com or tucows.com). These sites scan for viruses before posting the files. It's also a good idea to scan files you download from the Internet before you install them.
Ÿ Email - Computer viruses are not directly transmitted in the text of an email message. Viruses are contained in attachments to email messages. So if you don't open email attachments, you won't get a virus ... unless your email application is setup to automatically execute scripts or open Word documents. This is often the case with Outlook and Outlook Express -- which is why so many viruses target these email applications. In the real world, there are attachments you need to open. I highly recommend that you scan email attachments for viruses... I also highly recommend that you do not execute .EXE or .COM or .VBS attachments unless you know who they are from and have a real reason to open them. Any time you execute one of these attachments, you're at risk of infecting your computer.
Ÿ Networks - Since networks hook computers together and allow information to be passed back and forth, they are prone to viruses. Most large companies are pretty tight on virus checking, but many smaller firms aren't. Make sure your company has anti-virus software on the server, and make sure that your computer is also protected.
Anti-Virus Software
There are quite a few anti-virus software programs, but none of them work if you don't use them and if you don't keep them up to date. Most anti-virus software costs around $30, but there are even some freeware applications to protect your computer.
In the past I've run Norton Anti-Virus as well as McAfee VirusScan. Both are excellent products. PC Magazine has a review of the most popular anti-virus programs -- it's a good place to start if you want overview the most popular products.
I recently started using a freeware product called AVG Anti-Virus. So far I've been impressed, it's identified several viruses sent to me via email... and you can beat the price, it's free.
Don't let a virus ruin your day. With a little common sense and good anti-virus software, you can keep your computer happy and healthy in the New Year.
Related Links:
McAfee Virus Information Library - info on over 58,000 virus
http://vil.nai.com/vil/default.asp
McAfee Tips on Preventing Viruses
http://www.mcafeeb2b.com/naicommon/avert/avert-research-center/anti-virus-tips.asp
Norton Virus Encyclopedia
http://securityresponse.symantec.com/avcenter/vinfodb.html
PC Magazine Review of Anti-Virus Software
http://www.pcmag.com/category/0,2999,s%253D1594,00.asp
Free AVG Anti-Virus Software from Grisoft
http://www.grisoft.com/html/us_index.htm
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