Has your computer ever been infected by a virus?

I once had a porn dialer worm. Since 1994, I've been totally anal about keeping my PC safe, but when my online virus protection ran out a couple of years ago, I took about two weeks to decide if I really needed to renew it. I did decide to renew, but in the meantime a porn dialer snuck in, and I started getting all kinds of raunchy, vulgar, porn spam. Changing my email address solved the problem, and now I have my virus protection plus a firewall and two adware/malware programs running at all times on my DSL connection. I check constantly and the PC has quarantined a couple of minor infections immediately, but nothing else has ever had a negative effect on it. Knock on wood... :o)

Yes it certainly has. only the week before last I decided to refresh my server so I formatted the hard drive, installed my 'Windows 2000 Advanced Server' operating system,& Panda antivirus, then went to microsoft to install updates when my machine decided to slow right down to a crawl and then freeze.... The only thing I could do was to hard boot! As I was hitting the 'off' switch I remembered someone telling me of a virus which causes the same symtoms... I then switched the computer back on but ..... Yes thats right 'NO HARD DRIVE' so I had to go out and buy a new one. Sickening isn't it.

Not sure which trojan it was, but it infected my wife's computer and the kids computers. Mine was untouched. I've installed pest patrol and bit defender since then and things are running smoother now. I think it is the stuff from Yahoo messenger and Messenger Plus that infected our computers. What do you think? Do you think Yahoo has advertisers installing stuff on systems. Also noticed Lycos is a nasty adware server.

Have always had some form of protection. Can't believe folks who think it won't happen to them. It will and I think they deserve it in a way. I've had viruses show up on computer but they've been dealt with immediately and no problems ensued. I've got six apps running at the moment (most are free) and I do not open ANYTHING I didn't ask for. Just be aware and vigilant about updates.

I keep my AV & firewalls up to date, along with spyware prgrammes & use them regularly

My main focus in the company I work for is Virus prevention and removal. I am always up to date on definitions and scan my system daily, but every once in awhile a new one comes along and I can get infected while investigating. I find most infections on the clients I work on are due to human engineering. People will click on anything that grabs their eye, especially if it includes the word "Free". It?s annoying but it keeps allot of us employed.

that is not because it has an antivirus program running all the time. It is because I run Firefox on it and never fire up Outlook or Outlook Express. It's on our network and like all other computers is available to the internet full time via DSL. It runs Windows 2000 and Windows Update is run religiously. We have other machines with low trouble incidence, running Windows 2000 and Windows 98, and we do not have any full time online anti-virus software in place. We simply don't run Outlook/Outlook express, all email is done on the web with Google or Yahoo mail or another web mail client. The security settings on IE are set tighter than you might normally do them. Periodically we run Housecall, Adaware, and Spybot Search and Destroy. The most trouble we get is saying Yes to installing something without realizing it was a data gathering bot, or the occasional porn site wanting to take over the machine and dial an offshore phone number. In most cases simply reading the screen before we click solves the problem. The spam blockers in web mail have been improving, reducing to near zero the porn and get rich quick scheme junk mails with beacons in them and auto pop-ups.

I keep links to my toolset on my blog, left side easy to find: http://www.blogstogo.com/timothybloggins

No I haven't, but I have a Mac & it seems not many people are writing viruses for them. That could soon change though as Apple products are becoming more popular.

Since then I have created a file folder ''Check Weekly'' and in it I have the following programs: 01 Microsoft RegClean 02 AdAware SE 03 Spybot 04 McAfee Virus Scan
05 Zone Alarm (Free) I run them weekly after checking for updates, I have Windows on auto update and I've been good for the last 4 years on a 5 computer network here at home.

yes a long time ago i got hit by the bonzi buddy virus

then about three months ago was hit by a trogen

Never. My computer is a mac.
Any further questions ?

I had a virus once way back in 1991. I can't remember which one it was but since then I have continuously run Zone Alarm, Norton AV and AdAware. I have since upgraded to Zone Alarm Pro, added Spybot SD, Spyware Blaster and Webroot Spysweeper. It is a particlarly pernicious and perverted individual who takes the time to try to find a way to destroy something that someone else created. Some wiser than I have said that locks and bars keep out honest people, but a thief will always try to find a way to get in. I don't know that anything we do will deter virus writing vermin from from trying.

Probably because of a good virus program and plain dumb luck !!!

I have downloaded many viruses,why?becuase I keep a spare hard drive that I load up anti virus and anti spyware and adware and look for viruses and which is the best for zapping them.I have found that the best set up is AVG free anti virus, Zonealarm fire wall and Adware 6 anti adware with a back up of spybot search and destroy with spyware blaster.Also I use incredimail which apart from being fun to use has a good junk mail folder that you can view without opening any e mails and if you don't trust what you see you can clear the folder with one click of your mouse.The above setup is on my main hard drive and has been virus free for as long as I can remember.I have also tried the new microsoft xp anti spyware which shows alot of potential.

Mainly by the new ones like blaster and sober. But did have one in 2000 which kille my pc dead, green screen red screen black screen hard drive dead. Had to do a reformat, the lot. Why? wasnt computer savvy and didnt know I had to upgrade nortons! DUH!!!
Now I pay for macafees via aohell, but previously used Innoculate it, Sohpos and avg. They all work well enough, Panda is crap though.

hello everyone, first of all to say this is a great community and website, of course, my primary source for technology. Secondly about the virus dilemma, I was infected I believe but Im not sure because by running scandisk I somehow achieved to delete my windows system .dll files and I did not have the XP cd with me, it was the exam season and all my revision in the PC so you can imagine the annoyance, later I found out that there were Trojans present. Recently a W32 Trojan generator tried to get at me but I found it deep somewhere, filthy thing attached itself to some of my files, so I deleted those, and now I have AVAST Antivirus with Sygate firewall which are both very good especiall Sygate is a VERY powerful firewall sometimes senses danger cuz my ports are scanning my IP or something, so all I must say is keep protected from this neverending threat of ******** who have no lives and thus they have to create something to ruin ours. I fear that they are getting too advanced however there is always a counter-force, otherwise people wouldnt make money off of each other right? So to conclude I say keep safe, out of 'unstable' places cuz these things just jump right in uninvited at the moment you least expect them.. Peace

I can honestly say that my systems have never been infected with a virus. I am running a Microsoft OS, and I have for the twenty-plus years, not a 'Nix or Apple OS as some would presume. For my antivirus product, I use Trend Micro's PC-cillin 2005 Internet Security.

How do I do it?

1) Keep the antivirus patterns up-to-date.

2) Enable realtime scanner on all files.

3) Periodically, like once a week run a full system scan.

4) Enable incoming email virus scanning. I delete all attachments if they are infected.

5) Do not accept email from everyone and anyone. If I don't know that you're sending me an attachment, I delete it when it arrives. This includes the message-in-a message emails that come in from family. (Usually the ones that have AOL seem to do this).

6) Stay diligent, and keep the guard up using a firewall.

So that's how I keep virus free.

John

I never had any virues, I work on a Macintosh computer. I had been using the Apple Macintosh computer since I was in college 1989. Tha'ts 14 years.

Because the PC (Computers running on Windows) are cheaper to make and to buy, more than 90% of the people in the whole world use them. The Windows system is sold to many many manufacturers. So when you get a PC, any brand, you get a name, but the same Operating System (Windows) With every new version of the OS you get a little extra, but the basically the same.

There are so many users and so many hackers (programmers) for the PC. It makes them easy target. And there are so many people that don't like the Monopoly that MS Windows has.

The Macintosh on the other hand has a closed system, there are less people using it, so the virus makers don't bother to program virures.

Rememeber the Y2K (the year 2000), the people using Macintosh did not even think about anything going wrong with their computers.

I bought Norton Anti-Virus with my printer and before I had an internet connection. I kept it up to date. When Norton kept things secure by sending e-mails to their site, I changed to McAfee and I update every time I log on. I scan every time. I have only had a firewall for five years or so - and most of its reports are checks by my own syatem - but it is always on.

I got hit the Pretty Park virus back a couple of years ago. A friend was infected and I wasn't aware of this virus at the time. As soon as I tried to run the program and it didn't do anything I knew something was really wrong. I did some research on the web that let me know what it was and I was able to find a remover tool for it so I could clean mine and my friend's PC. Haven't had anything more since then.

computer companies should put a well known antivirus software on all computers with a years free update if they want people to buy there prouduct

Yes. Last year, I was attacked by netskyq and it completely erased all my system files. I had run a scan with Norton and it detected the virus. I thought I had removed the virus, but when Norton tried to erase the virus, the virus was activated and when I restarted it, I was missing certain files. Because I had thought I had erased the virus, and because I did not know the seriousness of the virus, I did not make the connection. However, I tried to fix the computer on my own and eventually lost more files. What I didn't know then was that they were still available on the hard drive if I would have taken it to a specialist right away, but the files became deteriorated after a couple of days and when the computer techie attempted to retrieve them, the files were so deteriorated that many of them were irretrievable. Lesson: Take care of those viruses right away!

It was my first Mac, a souped-up 6300e. I was very proud of it.
After 3 months, it crawled to a near-stop.
As I was reading about the possible infection by the virus, my hair stood up in the back of my neck, and, following the directives left on a tech web-site, I actually got rid of it all by myself.
I haven't been infected with anything since, and this, a 20" G5 with Mac OS X.3.9, is my third Mac.
Although I became cross-platform savvy and acknowledge Windows as the "de-facto" tool in most of the business world, I remain faithful to Mac for elegance and peace of mind.

I get hundreds of emails a day and even with good antivirus (RAV and now AVG), one can occasionally get through. While it was a pain, the antivirus removed the bagel worms and never failed to clean the machine. Short of flogging the SB's who think it's cool to unleash hell on earth, all you can do is have a good antivius and spyware software AND UPDATE THEM DAILY!!!

I have an Macintosh Laptop with OS 10.3. My computer was recently infected with hacktool. I would appreciate advise on how to get rid of it.

this is mainly due to using p2p software

Common sense is a big secret! Most don't have much.
Does your PC have anti-virus software? If no, you
better get some. Two at least. Now ask yourself, do I
visit the kind of websites where a virus might be
lurking? If so, you got to stop that. There are very
good anti-virus programs out that are freeware. Do you have a firewall? A real one! Not the toy they put
in WinXP. If not, get one. Again, there are very good
firewalls that are freeware. Install these things on
your PC and learn how to set them, and Keep it updated
too. This is a lot less hassle than format and reinstall.

I have been dealing with protecting myself from the virus bug since the days of the 2400bps modems. I had a friend that of all things to collect, he made up his mind that he was going to get every virus out there (what massive amount of infected disks). He is the one that gave me some great advise. Treat everything you receive knowingly and unknowingly as a potential virus carrier. I have followed that rule and to this date I have never had a computer infected with a virus. When it comes to emails that may contain a virus, I have several levels of security there as well. 1st level is I have multiple email accounts with different providers. One is given out to everybody, such as when I register on a web site for something. This account is protected by the provider, but it also is accepted and brought in by a mail reader that is purely text based. Everything that is not pure text isn't even accepted by the thing. Things that are attached are sent to an attachment folder and there it sits ready for scanning. I also treat this email account as if were my junk mail folder. 95% or more of the emails that go to this account are automatically deleted without being read. The second email account is the account that is primarily given to friends, relatives, and highly trusted companies. This email account is also protected by the provider. It is the account that I normally do read the messages found in it. This account is viewed by a reader that is able handle all forms of email. The third is my business email account with is protected by the company where I work. This email account is only given to business associates for business use. If things arrive into this account that did not orginate from within the company structure then it is automatically deleted. As you can tell I do a great deal of automatic deletions.

I work with computers daily and have for the last 30 years. I have seen what a hacked computer can do to a person and I refuse to be that person.

I will go to the suspicious site, and if it dies, I do not use it on my laptop (My Latitude C600 is XP, and my desktop is NT 4).
Ian