Malware and How It Affects You
I really wanted to start this blog with one of my funny long winded stories, but there is nothing funny about Malware. The truth is no matter what OS you are running, no matter amount of protection you have, and no matter how careful you are you are subject to Malware. In fact there is a 99.9% chance you have some type of Malware on your system right now. For all you Mac (Macintosh) users this goes for you to. If you haven’t read the news lately they have found three major security vulnerabilities in Mac OSX in the last week.
Modern Malware breaks down into five categories
Adware
Is software that invades your system in order to force unsolicited advertising upon you. Adware may or may not keep track of your Internet habits in order to force soliciting upon you. An example of Adware would be advertisement pop-up even when you are surfing the Internet.
Spyware
Is Software that tracks, stores, and reports information about you and your Internet surfing habits. The Information that Spyware tracks will be things like your name, phone number, address, usernames, passwords, social security number, e-mail address Internet surfing habits and much more.
Worms
Unlike viruses they do not attach themselves to files or other programs, they are independent and self replicating. Worms travel through a PC or Network sucking up resources forcing low resources and system crashes on your network and system. Worms are detectable with most virus protection programs. If you are not behind a firewall you will have little to no control on if you will receive a worm.
Trojan Horse
Is a destructive program like a virus, but comes disguised as some thing else like a piece of freeware, email attachment, or other program or file. This is why you must be cautious not to open e-mails from people you do not know, or download unknown software off the Internet. The outcome of a Trojan horse could be everything from loss of data to a compromised system.
Helpful Hint:
If you find a program on a website that you are unsure if it is unsafe or not check for it and it’s rating at download.com. If you do not find it there you will probably find a similar piece of software. Be careful on what you download from the Internet even from trusted sites.
Viruses
Is a destructive program that transfers by replicating itself onto other files like a Word Document, Spread Sheet, Executable, and more. It usually travels by using macros, but can be transferred in other ways. Viruses can also effect your systems boot sector or a hard drive partition. This is why a good virus protection like Norton’s by Symantec is recommended for your computer.
