Viruses!!

I just scanned my computer today and it found I had a virus. The scanner said that all I had to do was to delete the file and I did but is that enough? I'm not familar with computer inner works so I'm not sure if it can spread or if it's still there.

Also how could I have gotten it? I don't download anything from anyone I don't know. Any reasons? Help!!

Unless it is a particularly nasty Trojan virus, just deleting the file should take care of it. More than likely, it was a file with some abnormality that the virus scanner picked up as a possible problem. If not, as long as it was caught quickly (why we have scanners running constantly) and not activated or opened you should be fine.

Viruses can come from any number of places, and the creators of them are getting better and better at hiding them. The ones you hear about in the news are self-replicating. They will send themselves to everyone in an address book and reproduce exponentially. Most of the time the person "sending" the virus doesn't even know it was sent. There are also a few out there that can get you just be being on the wrong site, clicking on the wrong banner, etc. Most of the time these are on porn sites but sometimes hackers will get into legitmate sites and infect banners and such. The company doesn't even know it's been hacked since the content never changed.

And then there are the virus hoaxes that get passed around the internet through email. Some jerk who knows Windows will find a file that is pertinent to running the OS with an odd name that most people wouldn't recognize. They start the Virus Alert emails, telling of the "fix" which involves deleting said important file. Well meaning people email it to all their friends and family after they find the "virus" on their machines. They then destroy their own computers by following the "fix." That's the lazy way to create a virus.

I don't know a lot about viruses either. Did you borrow a CD from someone and use it in your computer? I had a virus only once (years ago) and that was because I used a floppy disk in a computer at the library and then put the same disk in my own computer. I wound up with a harmless partition(sp?) virus.

I'm not enough of a techie to tell you where to look for other signs of the virus but I think there are places (folders & files) that you can check.

If you remember the name of the file you were instructed to delete or know the name of the virus (or check the log of your virus scanner's activity log to get the name), you can go to one of a number of sites to get more info on the virus. One site that comes to mind is http://www.mcafeeb2b.com/naicommon/a...t-homepage.asp

As to how you got the virus, a lot of viruses are passed on without us knowing it. Even though you always know where your E-mails, files, etc. are coming from, that doesn't mean that the person who sent it was sure there were no viruses there. It's possible for us to send viruses to others if our virus software protection doesn't pick it up before we send something out. That's why it's important to keep virus protection software updated.

Hope it wasn't anything too bad!

If you scanned your computer using http://housecall.antivirus.com it picks up "uncooth" javascripts that have added pages to your favorites or tried to reset your homepage as virus'. They aren't exactly virus', but deleting them takes care of the problem.

Hope this helps,

Susan