Lee Hogan With years of reveling in doing away with viruses (AKA Malware), I know firsthand how tough and impossible it can be to eliminate viruses. I have spent limitless hours preventing, kicking, and screaming at a computer screen in hopes of sending the virus to a violent cyber-death. However, my non-public laptop has not been infected with a pandemic. Therefore, I am writing a ‘user manual for virus-free computing. Many valuable websites provide simple steps to staying easy. However, I am going to attempt to move one step further and give an explanation for some of the lesser-realized strategies.
The motivations at the back of the advent of viruses are numerous. Traditionally, the malware was turned into written by college youngsters for ‘bragging rights’ or through disgruntled employees. Today, most people of malware is written for monetary advantage. There are many approaches in which a malware author can make money off of you or your laptop. Their most important source of profit is using the rogue Anti-Virus software program to ‘scare’ the person into inputting their credit card so that they can ‘clean’ their laptop. This is an entire rip-off! What begins as a harmless warning about a plague for your gadget will become numerous pop-and-nag displays to the point that you can now not use the laptop. All the monitors factor you into ‘registering’ the software program to do away with this kind of virus. Once you “sign in to the software program,” the computer remains inflamed because the program asks to register the virus.
If you do manifest to provide them with your credit score card, you could contact your monetary group and request a new credit card and reimbursement of the cash charged. Clients of mine have executed this without any essential headaches. However, in all likelihood, a few banks will be more difficult to cope with than others.
Although there are technical matters you could do to keep viruses from infecting your device, this newsletter makes a specialty of the person and what you can do to keep from getting inflamed. Whether it’s far establishing an email message, downloading a track report, or trying to watch a video someone sent you on Facebook, (almost) all infections require the user to do something to get infected.
Never Search For ‘Free’ Things – This includes games, coupons, software, etc. If your youngsters use the Internet to find free video games, it’s miles handy a count of times before you get infected. Suppose you’re searching for software using the term ‘open supply’ instead of ‘free’‘. Searching for no-cost video games, coupons, and software will not simply open your computer to contamination but will heighten your risk of being worried about other scams.
Never View Unethical Sites – Never visit any ‘unethical’ websites on the Internet. This consists of pornography, hacking, and software program piracy websites. Depending on your source, maximum porn websites do not contain viruses; however, I might stay far away from any ‘unethical’ website online. As I stated in the introduction, those are steps that I have even used to remain virus-unfastened since the inception of the ARPAnet.
Never Watch Videos that Request a Download – This is a brand new tactic the malware authors have used in recent times; while looking to view a video, you get hold of a request to “update your java/Adobe Flash/different player” or “download codec to view video”. The update/codec is not a legitimate download, and once it’s far downloaded, your pc starts a downward spiral into a deep cyber-virus pit.
Always Download Drivers from the Manufacturer’s Website—In my profession, I need to constantly seek and download drivers. I do not have evidence that the 0.33-birthday party motive force websites contain viruses; however, applying them is unnecessary when you can download them instantly from the manufacturer’s website. Once more, this is what I have been doing for years to stay virus-free.
If you have been writing a chunk of malicious software to create wealth, you’ll write the software to run on the most commonly used platform. Therefore, if you, the consumer, use an operating gadget or browser that is not the ‘maximum used’, you’re substantially reducing (and in all likelihood removing) your chance of getting inflamed.
In my view, these exchange alternatives are getting simpler to use. I use a taste of Linux called Ubuntu on my personal pc. An Ubuntu or a Mac OS X gadget will no longer see a deadly disease for a LONG time. The more of the individual laptop market percentage Macs or Ubuntu start taking; the more likely malware authors will begin considering writing malware for the one’s structures. It isn’t always that those structures are loose from contamination (something techies like to discuss); however, as a substitute, it’s miles just no longer realistic for malware authors to spend time locating a venerability after which writing software to exploit that hollow.
What to do as soon as inflamed – You could utilize many resources to smooth your system. Online assets include ‘malware elimination boards’ where educated technicians will paint with you and provide you with step-through-step commands to clean your gadget. Some popular websites with an extremely trained technician to assist in eliminating viruses are GeeksToGo.Com andand BleepingComputer.Com. If you no longer want to dispose of the virus yourself, you can contact a nearby pc repair shop. I run a local PC restore store that offers products in the relevant Ohio areas.
Rick L. Jones is the proprietor of Integrity Computer Services, Which provides PC restoration and network control solutions to the greater Ohio area. He will graduate from Western Governors University with a Bachelor of Science in Information Technology and holds five industry-recognized I.T. Certifications.