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Understanding what a virus is, how it spreads and its different variations is an important step in being able to defend against virus threats. To make informed decisions about purchasing a virus scanner for your organisation, you also need to understand how a virus scanner works.
Most people are familiar with computer viruses, but may not have a clear definition of what they are. A computer virus is a self-replicating program. That is, it is produced in the same way as the calculator, paint and similar software you use on your computer. The difference is that instead of providing a benefit, it starts by causing harm. A virus will also have other negative functions such as deleting files or changing system settings. However, the most defining characteristic of a virus is its “self-replication and rapid spreading” activity. This growth alone can be a major problem for an infected network. It can cause excessive network traffic, preventing the organisation’s network from functioning properly.
A worm is a special type of virus. While some texts make a great effort to distinguish between worms and viruses, some sources treat a worm as a subset of a virus. A worm is a type of virus that can spread without human intervention. In other words, a virus requires a human action to infect a machine (such as downloading a file, opening an email attachment). However, a worm can spread to computers on its own without this interaction. In recent years, worm outbreaks have become more common than viruses. We see that most of what is called a “virus” today is actually a type of Worm.
The best way to fight viruses is to limit their spread. That is why understanding how they spread is extremely important. A virus generally spreads in two different ways. The most common and simplest method is to read your email address book and send an email to everyone in your address book. The second method is to scan connections on a network to which your computer is connected and then copy itself to other machines it can access. This is actually the most effective way for a virus to spread. However, it requires more programming skill than the other method. In today’s world, infected computers are isolated from the network to prevent virus spread.
The first method is by far the most common method of virus propagation. Microsoft Outlook is the single most frequently used email program for this type of virus attack. This is because Outlook is widely used — not because it has a security vulnerability.
Another way a virus can spread is to scan the network to which the affected system is connected and copy itself to detected and accessed devices. This type of automatic propagation does not require user interaction. Therefore, a program that uses this method to infect a system is classified as a worm.
Whatever form a virus takes when it confronts you, once it enters your system it will try to spread and in many cases will focus on damaging your system. Once a virus enters your system, it can do anything that any legitimate program can do. This means the virus can delete files, change system settings or cause other damage. The threat of virus attacks cannot be overstated. Some new virus outbreaks use technologies so advanced that they are capable of disabling existing security software such as antivirus scanners and firewalls.
Rombertik was a virus that caused chaos in 2015. It is spyware designed to steal confidential information by targeting users of Internet Explorer, Firefox and Chrome. It was first announced by researchers from Cisco Talos Security and Intelligence Group.
This malware used the browser to read user credentials from websites. Attached to an email, it would install itself as a background process and begin capturing all data entered into web browsers, regardless of whether it was on an encrypted connection. What made Rombertik particularly noteworthy was its self-destruct capability — if it detected it was being analysed, it would attempt to overwrite the hard drive’s master boot record, rendering the computer unusable.
Computer viruses come in several different varieties, each with its own characteristics and methods of infection:
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