Viruses & Ethics

By: Raymond Johansen
Submitted: 2007-01-17 16:10:05
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I am talking about Computer-Viruses, Spam, Spyware, Dialers, Hijackers and other threats that will make trouble for you.

Maybe you are one of the few lucky ones that never get a computer that's running slow. Then you probably won't need any online computer repair. If so, you could probably stop reading this article if you want, and return to whatever you were doing online. Anyway, I assume that most of you who are using the internet regularly have had one or more "troublemakers" sneaking through your cables and into your computer.

I prefer to call it "troublemakers" because trouble's all they want, Right? If you think about ethics when it comes to creation of online threats, whether it's a joke, a dangerous virus, or even a spam-email, they have an either profitable, educational, innocent or destructive agenda. Some just want to gather general info to learn. Some are more or less destructive, and some are out there to try to steal your private data. (such as bank account info etc.)

By saying this I just want you to be aware of that some threats you can easily deal with, but others you simply just don't want at all. Personally I do think there are ethics that are beeing followed when creating online threats. But these ethics are only followed by certain people.

There are all kinds of people on this planet, and most people are ok, but there will always be people with cruel intentions and burning desires of making the most trouble for others. They exist on the internet as well as in the real world.

Think of people that are abusing animals for instance. I can't in my wildest imagination understand what emotions that drives them to torture an animal, and even gives them joy of it. How could I sit at home with my computer and create a virus that will for example destroy maindrives on all computers infected? What joy will I feel when I know that hundreds, maybe thousands of people looses money, work and time beacuse of my evil works?

I would simply hate myself for that. I would most likely never go as far as to begin to create a Virus. I think I have enough to do by keeping people away from these troublemakers in the first place.

Remember that there are threats out there that you should treat with fear and caution. Not that I mean to scare you, just let you place it in your "Memory Warehouse" for safety. You should also know that there are three essential things you absolutely need to have installed on your computer to be properly secured:

* A Firewall protection. WinXp comes with a great one included. * An Antivirus Solution, and * Anti Spyware software. (Read more about these three main categories, news, and more about online threats on our website FreePcAssistance.com. Also find low cost quality security software.) There is one thing I really urge to share with you right now. These days a new generation of bugs are flooding the internet. They infiltrates your computer and brings up several Failure warnings. These could be like: "Infected with Spyware! Click Here to Fix Now" - And often signed by

"Protection Center" or similar. If you click one of the warnings that constantly pop up, you will be taken to a website to purchase the "needed" software to get rid of these "problems". What I am about to tell you now is Very Important. Do NOT buy this software! Why? You Ask.. Well, this so-called software claims to get rid of all kinds of bugs. But the fact is that THE ONLY THING it does in most cases is to remove itself. This software is made to infiltrate your computer and show a lot of warnings about your computer's bad health, and then throw you off and make you think you need to purchase their remedy for this.

You see, they give you the disease, and secondly they make you buy their remedy. Don't buy, because their software is the problem in the first place. These things evolve very quickly, so you need to be aware of this.

A Free solution to this? Yes, as a matter of fact I have one. But I don't like to turn to this solution, but sometimes I have to. Restore your Operating System. Format system-drive(s) and re-install Windows or the OS you use. This have in all my cases worked well. First time I was infected with this kind of bugs I remember that I was asked to download and install a Video Codek of some kind. After that something called "Protection Center" told me to buy a specific software to get rid of this problem, and others... I thought this sounded weird. Because Windows don't have such functions that will notify me that I am infected, and then recommend a particular brand for me. (If it could, it would propably recommend Microsofts own software, don't you think?) So I tried to remove it. But it was stuck.

It's worth doing a scan with all anti-bug software you posess because maybe you are lucky. If not, it must be the hard way. Do everything that's worth a shot, but please don't go and buy their damned software. It isn't worth a penny.

A good way to spot that you are infected with such a software is when you suddenly see a lot of warnings about the security. You see, spyware normally doesn't make a sound, or any notice at all. You won't see it if you don't mean to. Try to run a spyware killer that you trust. (Remember that you should have some kind of Anti Spyware software installed.) If it doesn't fix the problem, try your Anti-Virus software, and run a complete search and destroy. If nothing works, ask a friend with more computerskills than you to help you. There is No simple solution but to pay the $29, or whatever it costs, and purchase their remedy to get rid of the warnings. Well, you're stuck with software that won't find anything else than the bug that was injected into your computer earlier.

You are still unprotected against other threats, unless you have the three applications mentioned above in place. So it looks like it is the hard way again. Make sure you have an operating system with a working key available. Then format your harddrive(s) and install the OS.

When you are all done now, I encourage you to secure your computer from the threats out there.

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