Graham Cluley Viruses Quotations

Trojans are different from viruses because they can lurk in PCs without anyone noticing and can spy on the computer user's activities then send this information back anywhere in the world.

Viruses emerging for the Mac OS X platform is headline news for Apple fans, but they are currently posing far from the level of threat that Windows users face every day. No-one should panic, but this is an indication that hackers are showing an increased interest in targeting the platform.

There are a tiny number of mobile-phone viruses compared to the threat on the Windows platform.

To the untrained eye Mytob and Zotob can appear quite different: one group of viruses travels via email, the other primarily by exploiting a Microsoft security hole.

Worms and viruses are increasingly being written to steal confidential data from innocent people's computers, to hijack resources, or launch spam or denial-of-service attacks,

Compare what those viruses did to what happens today: If a worm steals your bank information or hacks into your accounts, that is it. You have been robbed.

It's important that businesses and home users ensure they are properly protected with automatically updated anti-virus software, and never open unsolicited email attachments. The criminals behind these viruses and Trojan horses don't stop just because it's the holiday season. They are counting on people returning in the New Year and not thinking before opening their email.

It's important to consider the amount of hacker activity associated with a particular flaw. And let's not forget that the vast majority of computer viruses are written for Windows computers.

It's disturbing to see a second worm for Mac OS X so soon after the first, but it should be remembered that this is only two compared to well over 100,000 viruses for Microsoft operating systems.

In 20 years, viruses have moved from floppy disks to file viruses, to e-mail viruses, to Internet worms, to targeted Trojan-horse attacks.

It's funny to us as we're so used to worms and viruses being bad news rather than making the world a better place.

If he had been scanning his email for viruses he would never have received the message from the Sober worm. If jailed he'll have plenty of time to reflect on whether he should have believed everything that was sent to him via e-mail.