MALWARE

MALWARE

1. virus

2. This is a piece of code that is designed to replicate itself

3. A virus will often be designed to delete or corrupt data.

4. One of the most famous worms is the ILOVEYOU email worm.

5. In 2000, it managed to infect nearly 10% of all internet connected computers, causing an estimated $8 billion in damages.

6. A trojan appears to be a harmless application - a downloaded game for example. You play the game, but meanwhile it is running in the background carrying out its real intent - maybe letting someone else access to your computer.

7. Spyware stays hidden out of view and is designed to spy on your computer, looking for personal information, passwords and so on.

8. Ransomware encrypts critical files and data, making them unusable. Eventually it presents the user with a ransom, demanding money be sent to the attackers to unlock the system.

9. Scareware will cause a pop-up to appear on your screen which will say something like 'Your computer has a virus. To clear the problem please purchase this software', and a link is provided in the pop-up. In reality, you do not actually have a virus. The scareware it trying to frighten you into purchasing and downloading the software which itself may actually contain malware.

10. Rootkits give other people permissions and access to your computer, allowing them to take it over remotely and do whatever they like. It is designed to run even before the operating system itself is booted up and it continues to stay active in the background while you are using the computer.

11. Malware is a general term for any hostile or intrusive software. For example it may disrupt computer operations (virus), or it may seek to secretly monitor what the user is doing (spyware).

12. Your browser can become infected with malware when you download certain plugins such as tool bar plugins.

13. Adware This malware can force your browser to display unwanted pop-up advertisements. It can cause pages that you didn't request to open up taking you to unwanted web sites. It can also take over your browser home page and direct you somewhere else every time you open up your browser (e.g. a porn page)