Responding to and Recovering from a Virus

Does your computer system seem to run slower than it should? Does it crash often and display error messages you don’t recognize? Play musical tunes you’ve never heard before? If your computer acts like it’s inhabited by ghosts, you may have a computer virus or some kind of spyware.

On the other hand, an unhealthy or overloaded system could cause some of these same problems — particularly sluggish performance. Your hard drive could just be running out of space, or you could have insufficient memory resources for the applications you’re running.

So how do you tell the difference between a virus and a system problem? Generally speaking, if you notice sudden, unexpected behavior, like strange sounds coming from your computer or file names you don’t recognize, you probably have a virus.

Action to be taken

Run antivirus software. Antivirus software is available at costs ranging from free to about $50 and is invaluable to your PC’s health. Most utilities can be set up to scan your machine’s memory continuously and alert you if it finds a corruption. It will also alert you when you try to open an infected file. But scanning isn’t fail-safe, so if your computer behaves suspiciously, run the antivirus software over your entire system to find and repair the infected files.

Replace files. If antivirus software can’t repair the damage, your only choice is to delete the infected files and replace them with clean copies from a recent backup.

Run a disk-repair utility. After you start your computer from the boot disk, run a disk-repair utility. Both Mac and Windows operating systems come with a disk-repair utility that you can use for this purpose. Once you get the computer up and running again, scan your entire system with antivirus software.

Reformat your drive. If running a disk-repair utility doesn’t work, your hard drive may be damaged. In this case, use a disk-repair utility to reformat it and then reinstall your system software from the original operating system disk.

Tips for Virus Detection and Prevention

• Do not open any files attached to an email from an unknown, suspicious or untrustworthy source.
• Do not open any files attached to an email unless you know what it is, even if it appears to come from a friend or someone you know. Some viruses can replicate themselves and spread through email. Confirm that your contact really sent an attachment.
• Do not open any files attached to an email if the subject line is questionable or unexpected.
• Delete chain emails and junk email. Do not forward or reply to any to them. These types of email are considered spam – unsolicited, intrusive messages that clog up the inboxes and networks.
• Do not download any files from strangers.
• Exercise caution when downloading files from the Internet. Ensure that the source is a legitimate and reputable one. Verify that an anti-virus program checks the files on the download site.
• Update your anti-virus software regularly.
• Back up your files on a regular basis. If a virus destroys your files, at least you can replace them with your back-up copy. You should store your backup copy in a separate location from your work files, one that is preferably not on your computer.
• When in doubt, always err on the side of caution and do not open, download, or execute any files or email attachments. Not executing is the more important of these caveats. Check with your product vendors for updates for your operating system, web browser, and email. One example is the security site section of Microsoft located at http://www.microsoft.com/security.
• If you are in doubt about any potential virus-related situation you find yourself in, you may report a virus to  virus product team you choose.