How to Protect Yourself From Virus | Complete Security Software

                                          Network Security

The Internet is a global computer network that unites a great variety of local networks, small, large and giant, as well as individual computing devices, from servers to mobile phones, located around the world. Almost unlimited access to information resources, the ability to organize operational communication and transfer data from one part of the planet to another (receiving the latest news) has made the Internet an indispensable tool for organizing work and leisure. Such a widespread of the world wide web could not leave people who are professionally involved in high-tech crimes, programmers looking for confirmation of their genius or suffering from an inferiority complex, and just maniacs without work. If literally a decade and a half ago, the harm inflicted by these categories of figures, could be limited only to the loss of information, now we are talking about theft of personal data, such as credit card numbers and codes, passwords for access to electronic payment systems and other confidential information. The damage from such attacks can be very high. Remember that in spite of any precautions, you can never ensure 100% security of your computer, and we are talking only about methods of protection that have already been shown to be effective.

In recent years, experts have been paying more and more attention to information security issues. There is nothing surprising in this because only direct damage from the penetration of viruses into the computer systems of companies is already calculated in billions of dollars (due to downtime, costs of destroying viruses, restoring information, etc.), and behind the scenes, questions remain related with leakage of financial information, development plans, etc. We dare to assure you that we, and any other Internet provider, do our best to ensure safe operation, but this may not be enough. Everything depends on you! And now we will try to give some recommendations that, we hope, will help you.

• Install Antivirus and  We recommend installing Protegent360 Complete Security Software

Viruses

Quite a long time has passed since the appearance of such a phenomenon as computer viruses. The first viruses, in comparison with the existing ones, seem to be just a child's prank. The development of modern technologies, the improvement of communications, the ever-deeper penetration of the Internet into our lives could not but affect the development of completely new types of viruses. For example, the Slammer virus, released in January 2003, in the first 15 minutes of the epidemic hit about 100 thousand computers and stopped 25% of the Internet.

All viruses are conventionally divided into the following categories:

• Classic computer viruses
  Varieties of the first viruses. They are transmitted through infected files. They are easy to treat.
• Network worms
  They are transmitted over local or global networks.
• Trojan horses
  When activated on a computer, I perform unauthorized actions - collecting information and transferring it to third parties, using computer resources, etc.
• Hacker utilities
  Other programs that harm either the computer or any resource on the network.

The mechanism of action of viruses and their consequences can be different: from damage to information stored on a computer and ending with unauthorized mailing on behalf of the computer owner or attacks on Internet resources.

To the question How to protect yourself from viruses? the best recommendation would be:

• Installation of an anti-virus program on the computer (recommended),  Protegent360 Antivirus,  and others). But remember that any anti-virus protection only makes sense when virus information is regularly updated. Using legal copies of programs will allow the anti-virus databases on your computer to be always up-to-date and keep pace with the release of new viruses.
• Avoid visiting sites with questionable content - this is the main source of the spread of viruses.
• Check floppy disks and other portable drives for viruses.
• Never open emails from unknown authors. Files attached to them can be infected.
• Sites with unlicensed software and hacking tools can be a source of serious danger.

Attacks

It is possible that your computer may be exposed to a hacker attack. What lies at its basis is up to you to judge. This may be an attempt at self-improvement by some young man who has read a lot of specialized literature, or a targeted attack by a professional.

Typical signs that your computer has been attacked (sometimes it is hard to tell who - a virus or a hacker) may be the following:

• too much outgoing traffic. In this case, the outgoing activity can be observed even when you are not working. Most likely, your computer is already being used for covertly sending spam or viruses.
• Increased hard disk activity or the appearance of incomprehensible files or folders in the root directories.
• The viral activity can be another option for a covert attack.

E-mail

E-mail is a means of transmitting text and files to the addressee via the Internet. The use of e-mail allowed people located both in the neighbouring entrance and on different continents to maintain prompt and regular communication with each other. At many enterprises, it has become a powerful tool for internal document management, replacing a huge pile of papers.

E-mails are transmitted over the network in the clear and remember that without the use of special means of protecting information (cryptography), your letters may be available to third parties.

In recent years, e-mail has become a powerful means of delivering viruses, hacker programs and, especially, spam - advertising letters. There are several ways to get your mailing address:

• a program that collects addresses is running on the path of the letter;
• You left your address yourself;
• a virus running on your computer or on the recipient's computer has transferred the entire address book to the developer (this is how the mail addresses of your acquaintances and friends get into the database!);
• theft of the address database of your mail provider (the situation is quite rare, although it cannot be ruled out 100%);

Here are some really useful tips to help protect your mailbox and your computer:

• install an antivirus - this is the most powerful tool against the penetration of viruses into your computer;
• never leave your email address on shopping sites, sites with questionable content, including pages with unlicensed software. If you still think that it is necessary to do this, then please open a mailbox on free servers, and save your address only for personal correspondence;
• never open or reply to letters from unknown authors or send them to read receipts. Many letters come with the Notify of the Delivery mark and it is only in your power to send a notification to the author or not;
• never save files received in letters from unverified sources on your computer;
• pay special attention to executable files (extensions * .EXE, * .COM, * .DLL, * .CPL, * .SCR, etc.) or archives (* .ZIP, * .RAR, etc.). Most antiviruses scan documents created in Microsoft Office, but all the same, if they came to you in a compressed form, then in no case open them without checking (Remember that modern viruses often have a double extension, for example, photo.jpg .exe. By running this file, you will indeed see a picture, but a running virus will show it to you!).
• always pay attention to the address from which the letter came. This address may differ from the one you know by only one letter or number, but believe me, this will be enough to infect your computer;
• in any case, do not reply to advertising letters that come to you. It is possible that the address was chosen by chance and the spammer is just waiting for an answer!