Virulent computer virus

Running multiple anti-malware apps at the same time can cause your system to be slow or unstable. If you install an anti-malware app from a different company, Microsoft Defender will automatically turn itself off. If you install two anti-malware apps from other companies, however, they might both try to run at the same time. Don't open email messages from unfamiliar senders, or email attachments that you don't recognize - Many viruses are attached to email messages and will spread as soon as you open the attachment.

It's best not to open any attachment unless it's something you're expecting. For more information see: Protect yourself from phishing. Use a pop-up blocker with your internet browser - Pop-up windows are small browser windows that appear on top of the website you're viewing. Although most are created by advertisers, they can also contain malicious or unsafe code. A pop-up blocker can prevent some or all of these windows from appearing.

The pop-up blocker in Microsoft Edge is turned on by default. If you're using Microsoft Edge, make sure SmartScreen is turned on - SmartScreen in Microsoft Edge helps protect you from phishing and malware attacks by warning you if a website or download location has been reported as unsafe.

For more info, see What is SmartScreen and how can it help protect me? Pay attention to Windows SmartScreen notifications - Be cautious about running unrecognized apps downloaded from the Internet. Unrecognized apps are more likely to be unsafe. When you download and run an app from the internet, SmartScreen uses info about the app's reputation to warn you if the app isn't well-known and might be malicious. Crude Oil Gold 1, Silver Vix CMC Crypto 1, FTSE 7, Nikkei 28, Read full article.

October 28, , PM. Story continues. Recommended Stories. Motley Fool. Investor's Business Daily. Yahoo Finance Video. A Windows worm first discovered in , it was created by computer science student Sven Jaschan, who also created the Netsky worm.

While the payload itself may be seen as simply annoying it slows down and crashes the computer, while making it hard to reset without cutting the power , t he effects were incredibly disruptive, with millions of computers being infected, and important, critical infrastructure affected.

The worm took advantage of a buffer overflow vulnerability in Local Security Authority Subsystem Service LSASS , which controls the security policy of local accounts causing crashes to the computer. It will also use the system resources to propagate itself to other machines through the Internet and infect others automatically.

This led to more than a million infections , taking out critical infrastructures, such as airlines, news agencies, public transportation, hospitals, public transport, etc. Jaschen was tried as a minor and received a 21 month suspended sentence. Zeus is a Trojan horse made to infect Windows computers so that it will perform various criminal tasks.

The most common of these tasks are usually man-in-the-browser keylogging and form grabbing. The majority of computers were infected either through drive-by downloads or phishing scams.

First identified in , it managed to compromise thousands of FTP accounts and computers from large multinational corporations and banks such as Amazon, Oracle, Bank of America, Cisco, etc. Controllers of the Zeus botnet used it to steal the login credentials of social network, email and banking accounts.

The entire operation was sophisticated, involving people from around the world to act as money mules to smuggle and transfer cash to the ringleaders in Eastern Europe. In late , the creator of Zeus announced his retirement but many experts believe this to be false. Also known as Downup or Downadup , Conficker is a worm of unknown authorship for Windows that made its first appearance in The name comes form the English word, configure and a German pejorative.

It infects computers using flaws in the OS to create a botnet. The malware was able to infect more than 9 millions computers all around the world, affecting governments, businesses and individuals. The worm works by exploiting a network service vulnerability that was present and unpatched in Windows.

Once infected, the worm will then reset account lockout policies, block access to Windows update and antivirus sites, turn off certain services and lock out user accounts among many. A German student, Jaschan was arrested when multiple tip-offs were reported to the police. Because he was under 18 when he wrote the virus, Jaschan spent his prison sentence on probation. MyDoom was spreading rapidly at the time and Jaschan, a newbie coder, wanted to see what would happen if his bug could spread faster than MyDoom.

Things quickly escalated from there. Sasser was so effective it actually ground one third of the post offices in Taiwan to a halt, shut down branches of a Finnish bank, and forced rail and transatlantic flights to be cancelled.

Quite a lot, as it so happens. So in the early to mid-noughties, Anna Kournikova was one of the most searched terms on the internet. People were just very into tennis. The mayor of the town came forward and said the city should be proud to have produced such a talented young man and offered him a job as a techie once he was finished his education. While most of the malware on this list strictly hit computers, Slammer was created with broader ambitions.

Slammer is the kind of virus that makes it into films, as only a few minutes after infecting its first victim, it was doubling itself every few seconds.

Slammer, quite aptly, caused a huge panic as it had effectively managed to crash the internet in 15 quick minutes. Stuxnet is easily the scariest virus on the list as it was built by government engineers in the US with the intention of obstructing nukes from being built in Iran. Stuxnet spread by a USB thumb drive and targeted software controlling a facility in Iran that held uranium.

Stuxnet is the first real venture into cyberwar and it definitely asks the question as to what will come next. So there you have it: while viruses and malware might seem like a myth drummed up by tech companies, they are a very real threat that have caused billions in damage.

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