Trojans find there way to your computer because your downloaded it from a site and it was executed. Trojans usually are small .exe programs. It can also enter your computer by a malicious email attachment.

Trojans vary from annoyance to more serious financial loss. Hackers can gain backdoor entry to your computer and access confidential information such as credit card, social security number, or sensitive data you just want to keep private.

Examples of common Trojan are:

1. Trojan.win.32.obfuscated.gx

You may get an error message telling you that your browser was infected by trojan.win.32.obfuscated.gx. and you need to clean your system immediately or it will crash.

2. Trojan Vundo B and variants

This little bugger will cause pop ups to appear on your Internet Explorer browser everytime you log on to the internet and try to open a new page. If you have IE 6.0 and above with tab browsing feature, you will have multiple advertisements appear as new tabs. The anti virus I had could locate the problem but was unable to solve this trojan. It would say that the trojan was detected but unable to clean this error.

3. Trojan Horse dropper.heliosb.I

This one can be detected and quarantined. It will still lurk in your computer after you move the file to the recycle bin.

Because Trojan variants can be found around the web, you can keep your computer safe by installing the best trojan shield. This detects incoming and suspicious files in your email, and can also warn you just before you plan to download a file.

Advances in computer technology is a double-edged sword. On one hand, it affords us quick and easy access to numerous conveniences such as bank statements, favorite shopping centers, school and health records, and more. On the other hand, it can also grant the same access to those who aren?t supposed to get it. Although it?s a rare occurrence, hacking has become the biggest criminal nuisance in computer history.

The explosion in Internet use has brought with it the very real threat of viruses that can attack the unwary user. Viruses come in many forms – installers, Trojans and worms all of which can affect the performance of your computer and your privacy seriously. Viruses affect the computer either by corrupting programs or by replicating themselves and denying resources to legitimate programs. Trojans usually come disguised as something desirable and are activated when you try to open or run them. Worms and some Trojans may send themselves to people in your address book in emails, without your knowledge.

Even though the threat posed by viruses is serious, a few precautions taken in time can help you protect and sanitize your computer against viruses.

1. Browse with Caution – Most viruses enter your computer as a result of clicking on pop ups or other links in websites that are not trustworthy. Do not follow links or click on pop ups that could install viruses on your computer.

2. Open Emails Cautiously – At times, even if the subject is innocuous, emails can contain links that lead to a virus entering your computer. If the email is not from a trusted source, treat it with caution.

3. Open Email Attachments with Care – The attachment that the email urges you to open may contain a virus! Make sure your mail manager allows you to preview the type of file (.exe, .com, .vbt in attachments are probably viruses. The same goes for screensaver programs that come to you unsolicited).

4. Installing downloaded programs – Programs downloaded from the Internet can pose a serious threat to your computer. Make sure that the program you have downloaded is from a trusted site or has a certificate issued by a trusted certifying authority.

5. Firewall – There are several firewall software packages available that allow you to prevent unauthorized access to your computer that could be initiated by an infected system.

6. Antivirus – A good antivirus package residing in your computer can be the best protection you can have against viruses. Choose an antivirus package that can comprehensively defend itself against viruses.

7. Regular Virus Scan – The mere presence of anti-virus software in your computer is not enough. Scanning of your computer for viruses must be done on a regular basis to locate and isolate viruses.

8. Update the Anti-Virus – It is very important to update the anti-virus program itself periodically. New viruses are introduced every day and the manufacturers of the anti-virus software update the virus database and capabilities of the anti-virus program regularly.

9. Update windows and all other software – Do not forget to update the Operating System and other software regularly as they are frequently patched to overcome security loopholes and vulnerabilities.

10. Removable Media – Removable media like floppies and USB drives are a major factor facilitating spreading of viruses. Use only trusted devices on your computer.

How To remove the Conficker Virus

That Confounded Conficker virus! A brief summary on how to tackle this threat.

Download the Conficker Removal Tool Here.

Additional information on the the vuirus may be obtained from the PC and Tech Tips blog;

http://tips-reviews-how-to.blogspot.com/

It is still not known whether the perceived threat posed by the virus, variously known as Conficker, Downadup, and Kido, will actually turn out to be the biggest ever internet April Fool’s joke or is actually a serious computer threat.

The virus buries itself deep inside a the Windows operating system, where it can be used by hackers to steal users’ passwords and personal information, including bank details, credit card information and any other types of personal information.

Once it is invoked by the pc user, it proceeds to download information from a controlling server, other infected PCs then form a network or a “botnet” and can “talk” to each other, updating and evolving.The source of the downloaded files can then be redistributed among the millions of infected computers. The botnet is basically a drone pc that passes on the malicious programs to other computers. Although your pc may only be serving the malicious files and not actually dong anything else, it can render your pc useless while it download the files and eats your bandwidth.

Experts believe that from midnight on April 1, the Conficker program will start scanning thousands of websites for a new set of instructions telling it what to do next.

At this point, no one really know what the intent is.

Symantec has released a Conficker, Downadup, and Kido virus cleaner which can be downloaded here.

Stay tuned for further developments!

The ideal solution to the threat of virus is prevention. Do not allow a virus to get into the system in the first place. This goal is, in general, impossible to achieve, although prevention can reduce the number of successful viral attacks. Best approach would be detecting, identifying, and removing.

If detection succeeds but either identification or removal is not possible, then the alternative is to discard the infected program and reload a clean back up version.

Advances in virus and antivirus technology go hand in hand. Early viruses were relatively simple code fragments and could be identified and purged with relatively simple code fragments and could be identified and purged with relatively simple antivirus software packages. As the virus arms race has evolved, both viruses and, necessarily, antivirus software have grown more complex and sophisticated.

There are four generations of antivirus software. First generation scanner requires a virus signature to identify a virus. The virus may contain ?wild cards? but has essentially the same structure and bit pattern in all copies. Such signature-specific scanners are limited to the detection of known viruses. Another type of first-generation scanner maintains a record of the lengths of programs and looks for changes in length.

A second generation scanner does not rely on a specific signature. Rather, the scanner uses heuristic rules to search for probable virus infection. One class of such scanners looks for fragments of code that are often associated with viruses.

A scanner may look for the beginning of an encryption loop used in a polymorphic virus and discover the encryption key. Once the key is discovered, the scanner can decrypt the virus to identify it, then remove the infection and return the program to service.

Another second-generation approach is integrity checking. A checksum can be appended to each program. If a virus infects the program without changing the checksum, then an integrity check will catch the change. To counter a virus that is sophisticated enough to change the checksum when it infects a program, an encrypted hash function can be used.

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The encryption key is stored separately from the program so that the virus cannot generate a new hash code and encrypt that. By using a hash function rather than a simpler checksum, the virus is prevented from adjusting the program to produce the same hash code as before.

Technology can be used in productive way or destructive way.

Once with the 2005 electoral ferment in Great Britain, a Trojan worked his way in users PC’s, masked by a news report related to vice president Tony Blair.

So, a mail that circulated around Albion had as subject the following text:” Tony Blair’s e-mail account has been hacked by BBC news”. But as soon as a curious person would click on the respective link a Trojan would appear on his computer.

Unlike worms, the Trojan horse doesn’t auto reproduce itself on the infected PC, but it disguises as something harmless, like a screensaver.

Installed on the PC, the Trojan can capture passwords or user names or can allow a hacker to take over the respective PC.

The creators of the Trojan virus knew that many people were interested in news. When it came to the Tony Blair situation, the need for politic news that public manifested was exploited by the attackers, so they made use of Tony Blair’s name to make some victims, according to Sophos.

The Tony Blair attempt wasn’t the first time malicious codes creators made use of the British premier’s name. Back in 2003, the PC worm Quarters-A contained a string against Blair’s politics regarding the integration in the UN.

Actually, the worm was after infected as many PCs as possible to facilitate a DOS attack against the site www.number-10.gov.uk, site where Tony Blair intentions and politics were clearly stated.

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If you really want to take the work out of looking for that right Spyware Protection from a Spybot go to the Internet and get a Free Spybot Download or a Spybot Search and Destroy

to prevent your vital information from being ripped from your computer.

We probably have to deal with Trojans evey day and we don’t even know it. But the good thing is that antivirus software detects then right away and that they are virtually harmless for our files, as they only offer backdoors to hackers but don’t infect our files.

When you work with a computer, doesn’t time flies? Let me guess, you’re probably on your computer about two or three hours every day. Am I right? Also, if you work on a computer at home or in some cramped cubicle, you may spend the majority of your day on a PC.

Now, I hope you’re being cautious for all the time you spend typing, surfing, downloading, reading, and sending. After all, the last thing you need is a Trojan horse or irremediable virus who will destroy your system.

Yes this can be a headache and a half. Not only can it damage your work, but it may also cost you your entire hard drive. That means all you have saved in the past; work, family photos, downloads, the whole shebang. It is pretty sure that you need some decent anti virus protection.

Last year I got hit hard. Not by a crazy shmoe in a smoky bar either. I mean at home in my own family room. That room where you believe you are safe and comfortable at all times. Sorry to say but when it comes to cyberspace, security has gone out the window. Or sometimes it look that way.

I was doing my usual web browsing. Just looking in the Internet for a few new desktops to grace my PC screen. Then unexpectedly it happened. My screen went blurry just as I downloaded a horror flick wallpaper.

What was the deal! I was certain I had excellent anti virus protection. How could I get smacked out of nowhere by a random computer virus? Well, a good thing, my laptop was not the same. I shut it down and tried to restart, but it wouldn’t comply.

I decided to see a specialist. He informed me that my system board was fried. OUCH. This was going to be costly; I could tell. He could not tell me if it was a virus when I asked him.

However, I pretty much know it was that darn horror movie wallpaper I tried to download. That is when it all started. 450 dollars later, I had a fixed computer. I went back online right away and downloaded the best free anti virus protection I was able to find. I keep on updating once every two weeks or so.

I hate that this is a never-ending story. Just as anti virus protection advances, the vicious viruses advance as well. Who in God’s name is creating this garbage and don’t they have something else to do? Just a heads up; your PC or Mac is at stake, so stay recent with your anti virus protection.

iPod music downloads are easily accessible nowadays with so many sites offering online music downloads for our iPods. There are a handful of download sites in the market. So what?s the difference between all of them? Let?s go on a short tour to educate ourselves before we click for our next iPod music download.

There are mainly 3 types of iPod music download sites. All of them use a different business model. One group of them charges you for either per music download, or monthly subscription for a limited number of song or music downloads. Another group of them charges you a flat fee for lifetime access to unlimited iPod music download. The third group offers you music MP3 files for free. One quick glance and we may jump to the conclusion that free must be the best choice. The truth cannot be further from that as we unravel the neater details of each group, and compare them in terms of pricing, download speeds, security and protection in downloading and the selection of music files.

Monthly Subscription/Pay Per iPod Music Download Sites

Let?s identify some of these sites. The downloading speeds are at 128 to 192 kilobytes per second (kbps). iTunes, the main iPod music download site falls into this category of course. It costs $0.99 per track, $9.90-$13.99 per album. Other sites include eMusic, MusicMatch, Walmart etc which charge about slightly lesser than $1 per song download, $7-$15 per album and $15 monthly subscription. These music download sites offer catalogues of between 500,000 to 1.5 million iPod downloads. Downloading online music at these sites is secured, and you can be rest assured that it does not expose you to unnecessary viruses or adware attacks.

Free iPod Music Download Sites

You may already be familiar with some of the names of these iPod music download sites like Limewire, Kazaa and IMesh. There are no costs associated with downloading music MP3s from these file sharing networks for your iPod. There are millions of music files available for downloading. File sharing is not necessarily illegal if the piece of music you have downloaded is not copyrighted. Unfortunately, there is a shroud around the issue of legality at these file sharing networks.

Downloading copyrighted iPod music is obviously against copyright laws. Anything else seems to be absolutely fine and safe. Put aside this legality issue, you have to worry about adware, spyware and harmful virus attacks when downloading from this site. If you do not have important documents in your computer, then it shouldn?t bother you too much. However, I would still advise you to get the best anti-virus and adware, spyware protection software to guard your PC. It?s simply not worth it to lose your whole computer?s data for the cheap thrill of free music.

Sites that offer Flat Fee for Lifetime Access to Unlimited iPod Music Downloads

These are the new kids on the block. For a one-time fee as low as $40 dollars or less, you get a lifetime membership to these iPod music download sites. There are no limitations on the number of music files or albums you want to download. Downloading music MP3s is straightforward as the user interface is dummy-proof and professional instruction tutorials are handed to you to guide you along. These sites understand the importance of IT security. You would receive a suite of anti-virus, spyware and adware protection software to ensure that your PC is like a fortress against these harmful elements. The fear of being exposed to viruses, adware and spyware is totally unfounded when accessing to iPod music downloads at these sites. However, you have to be careful as some sites are now masquerading as these flat-fee membership sites, promising to offer the sky but are of course unable to deliver the quality we would expect.

I hope that these tips are handy to you. To find out more about one-time membership sites, visit my blog which is packed with tips on what to look out for in a good download site and read a review of the top-performing sites for iPod music downloads today.

The content of this article is provided for the purpose of education and illustration only and is in no way associated with Apple, iTune, or any company or subsidiary of Apple. This article may be freely reprinted or distributed in its entirety in any ezine, newsletter, blog or website. The author’s name, bio and website links must remain intact and be included with every reproduction.

A more recent development in malicious software is the Email virus. The first rapidly spreading e-mail viruses, such as Melissa made use of a Microsoft word macro embedded in an attachment. If the recipient opens the email attachment, the word macro is activated. Then the email virus sends itself to everyone on the mailing list in the user`s email package. The virus does local damage.

At the end of 1999, a more powerful version of the email virus appeared. This newer version can be activated merely by opening an email that contains the virus rather than opening an attachment. The virus uses the visual basic scripting language supported by the email package.

A new generation of malware that arrives via email and uses email software feature to replicate itself across the internet. The virus propagates itself as soon as it is activated (either by opening an email attachment or by opening the email) to all email addresses known to the infected host. As a result, whereas viruses used to take months or years to propagate, they now do so in hours. This makes it very difficult for antivirus software to respond before much damage is done. Ultimately, a greater degree of security must be built into internet utility and application software on PC`s to counter the growing threat.

An e-mail virus has some of the characteristics of a worm, because it propagates itself from system to system. However, we can still classify it as virus because it requires a human to move it forward. A worm actively seeks out more machines to infect and each machine that is infected serves as an automated launching pad for attacks on other machines. Network worm programs use network connections to spread from system to system. Once active within a system, a network worm can behave as a computer virus or bacteria, or it could implant Trojan horse programs or perform any number of disruptive actions.

To replicate itself, a network worm uses some sort of network vehicle. It may use Electronic mail facility, Remote execution capability, and remote login capability.

Quick Note: Taking the Nonsense out of looking for the right spyware remover

If you really want to take the work out of looking for that right Spyware Protection from a Spybot go to the Internet and get a Free Spybot or a Free Spybot Search and Destroy

Download, In order to prevent your vital information from being ripped from your computer get your Spybot Remover Today.

A worm mails a copy of itself to other systems, a worm executes a copy of itself on another system, and a worm logs onto a remote system as a user and then uses commands to copy itself from one system to the other.

Virus or worm is created and destroyed by man

It all started out as a fairly normal day, even though I was getting ready to go on a great vacation. I was really excited about the trip that was about to go on and had packed about a week earlier so that I wasn’t rushed around at the end. I was just moving around the house doing some last-minute things when I decided that it would probably be a good idea if I were to back up my hard drive before I left. I really haven’t been paying as much attention to my backups as I should, so I went online to download a program to help me to move all of my files to my external hard drive. I downloaded the program and set it to transfer all of the files from my C drive over to my external. As soon as I finish transferring the files I turned my computer off and left for vacation.

A week later I returned from vacation refreshed and ready to get back to work. I turned on my computer and walked away to put some things into the laundry. When I returned to my computer I realized that it hadn’t started up at all. No matter what I tried I could not get Windows to load and that’s when I realized that the backup program I had downloaded contained a Trojan horse virus.

I don’t know how familiar you are with Trojan horse viruses, but they are small programs that are loaded in with other programs or pictures. They really don’t do any harm when you download them to your hard drive. Once you activate the program that you downloaded, however, the Trojan horse virus becomes active as well. In this particular case it immediately went and erased some vital system files that prevented me from starting Windows normally. But this isn’t all that the Trojan horse viruses can do to your computer.

A Trojan horse virus, once it becomes active on your computer, can take many different forms. It can do tricky things to you such as opening your CD tray or causing your cursor to disappear. It can also open up a port on your computer and allow other malicious programs to enter in. These other programs can do everything from stealing passwords and personal information to taking control of your computer and locking you out of it entirely. In the case of my computer, it had corrupted files enough that I was unable to start it at all. To me this was devastating as I use my computer for work every day.

Although it took me quite a few days, I was able to successfully restore my computer. I lost a lot of data in the meantime as I needed to format the hard drive and reinstall Windows and all of my programs. Fortunately for me, my computer was in need of being formatted and cleaned anyway. I ended up with a much smoother running machine in the process. The moral of the story? Be cautious of any download and if you don’t completely trust the file then don’t run it.