Malware

Malware is malicious software, designed to cause as many problems on a computer as possible. It is distributed, normally through the Internet, by someone who wishes to cause damage to an individual or company.

There are many kinds of malware, but the most common types are:

1. Viruses

2. Worms

3. Trojans

4. Spyware

5. Adware

Spyware is used to spy on your computer using a program called a keylogger. A keylogger records every key pressed by the user and then sends them to a remote computer when it is connected to the internet. This allows the criminal to steal all sorts of information such as passwords or even email addresses.

Adware is used to simply force adverts on to a user.
For example when the user open your web browser it opens several advertising websites instead of the normal homepage.

Computer viruses are small computer programs made with normal code that have a malicious intent.
A virus normally is activated when a normal program, such as Microsoft Word, is started.

Worms are likes viruses, except that unlike viruses worms do not need to attach themselves to emails or applications and can run themselves whenever they want to.

The most common types of worms clog up a computer system after self-replicating themselves.

Eventually the worm spreads across a network the computer system is connected to.

One of the most famous worms was the Blaster worm.

Worms differ from viruses as they don’t need to attach themselves to a program and can run without a program to run them.

A trojan horse is a piece of malware that disguises itself as a piece of useful software.

A trojan horse attacks the computer it is hosted on.

Other than passing themselves around a network, malware is often distributed through emails or downloaded from websites.

Junk emails often include links to other websites that download files onto your computer

Running programs without knowing where they came from

Anti-virus software is used to scan for all kinds of malware including viruses, worms, adware, spyware and trojans.

Anti-virus software can also, sometimes, remove malware.

The process of phishing is very common nowadays. The process for phishing is:

1. Sending a user an email or text pretending to be someone such as their bank and asking them to confirm details such as the bank account numbers (the bite)

2. Getting the user to ‘confirm’ (give) their details to the scammer.

3. The scammer using their details to access their account