Malware Essay

711 Words2 Pages

Malware, which is short for malicious software, nowadays is a term used for software that may harm your computer. People often use malware and viruses interchangeably, but they are not the same thing. Viruses are a form of malware. There are many forms of malware, but the most common types are viruses, worms, spyware, rootkits, and trojans.
A virus is a piece of code that spreads through some user interaction(going to a shady website or downloading a file), usually written with evil intentions. A virus infects files that already exist on systems. They are not their standalone programs. It is designed to wreak havoc on a computer and spread itself from one file to another, then from computer to computer. (“What Are Viruses, Worms, and Trojan
With the world's increase in computer usage, we have used our computers for tons of personal information such as banking online. Horrible things can be hidden in links, downloaded files, or pop-ups. The best way is to have a form of antivirus or antimalware installed. An antivirus program is an antimalware program. Moreover, while the term malware can technically apply to things other than viruses (I.E., potentially unwanted programs, adware, and spyware.) malware and virus are widely used interchangeably. You want to run a program that has real-time scanning capability, and probably both web content filtering and firewall or intrusion defense as well. It is not a bad idea to have some mail scanning feature either. Preferably you should use an antivirus program which does both signatures based (heuristic) and behavioral based (anomaly) monitoring and detection. That means that the antivirus scanner not only looks at files known to be dangerous but also looks at other programs running on your computer displaying typical malicious or abnormal behavior. You should always look up the detection and removal ratings of any antivirus program you buy, by researching tests run by independent eval companies, like Anti Malware Testing Standards

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