COMPUTER

VIRUSES
Joseph Michael E. Aramil
What is a computer virus?
 Computer virus is called virus because
they share some of the traits of
biological viruses
 It is a program which attaches itself to,
overwrites or otherwise replaces another
program in order to reproduce itself
without the knowledge of the pc user.
 Some virus are harmless, some may
cause random damage to data files.
Why do people create
computer virus?
 Some people think its funny to create
mischief
 Some people are angry. To get revenge
they create virus.
 Some people are intellectuals who want
the challenge of trying to create a
program that replicates itself.
 Some people want to become famous
by inventing viruses.
Virus Mischief
Some viruses print nasty
messages
Some viruses erase files or
even the entire hard drive
Some viruses screw up your
computer
Some viruses clog your
computer, by giving the
computer more commands
until it freezes your
computer.
Propagation tricks
Trojanhorse
a pleasant –seeming
program that secretly
contains a virus.
Time bomb
they purposely delay
damaging your computer
until you’ve accidentally
transmitted the virus to
other computers
 Viruses can be transmitted by:
 Booting a pc from an infected medium
 Executing an infected program
 Opening an infected file
Routes for virus infiltration
Floppy disks or other media
that users can exchange
Email attachments
Pirated software
Shareware
downloads
Kinds of viruses
File virus – also called a
parasitic virus, it attaches
itself to an innocent
program. When you run the
program you’re running the
virus too.
Boot-sector virus – a virus
that hides in the boot
sector, on a floppy disk or
hard disk, the first sector is
called the disk’s boot sector
or master boot record
(MBR)
Multipartite – it hides in two
places, boot sector and
also the file system.
Macro viruses – hides in
macros, which are little
programs embedded in
microsoft word documents
and excel spreadsheets.
Email worms – malicious
program that comes as an
e-mail attachments and
pretends to be innocent
fun.
DOS (Denial of service)
attacks – ignores or denies
access to a target because
it’s too busy.
Hoaxes – an e-mail
message that contains a
scary incorrect rumor and
warns you to pass the
message to all your friends.
It
is not a program its just a
document. Theoretically it
does “no harm”. it just
wastes your time.
Anti-virus Measures
Preparation
Prevention
Detection
Containment
recovery
Anti-virus software
Are programs that are installed
onto your computer and can scan
and remove known viruses wich you
may have contracted.
Ex.
Norton antivirus, Mc Afee, Sophos,
AVG, Nod32, Avira, Bitdefender,
Kaspersky