As we all know, Internet nowadays is full not only of useful information (although it makes the biggest part of it), but with various malicious parasites too. The majority of users are aware of the fact that such harmful pests exist, but not every user can see the difference between viruses, Trojans or keyloggers. The main aim of this article is to explain what different types of parasites do and why should you beware of them.
- Viruses. This type of parasites is the most popular and probably the most harmful one. Computer viruses are small programs, written with one aim of damaging infected machines. This damage can be different and vary from innocent but annoying jokes (like displaying unwanted message boxes) to damaging hardware and deleting all files from all hard disks. PC viruses can also include a VERY unpleasant ability – making their own copies and sending them to other users. This mass-mailing technique is the main reason of so-called epidemics, when different machines from all over the world get infected with the same parasite.
- Spyware. This category includes parasites, which rarely damage infected PCs directly. Instead of doing that, spyware prefers spying, stealing personal information and other unwanted activities. Although the risk of having your PC unusable after getting infected with spyware is lower, it is still recommended to install special antispyware program in order to protect your system from getting infected with pest of this type.
- Malware. Software of this kind includes various malicious (malware = MALicious + softWARE) programs, designed for damaging your PC. This definition is quite a broad one, because it includes viruses, Trojan horses and other pests, which can virtually be written into other categories.
- Parasiteware. Same as malware, but with other components. Parasiteware is a term, created for describing a group of negative programs, called “parasitesâ€. A parallel with real parasites can be created here – software of this kind usually writes itself into infected PC’s memory, uses its resources and, as a result of this, makes infected machine slower or even completely unable to work.
- Stealthware. This category includes special type of pests, which have one really dangerous common feature. By using their poshisticated stealth algorithms, these can fool security systems of your PC, get themselves installed on it and, of course, start performing destructive actions. Stealthware is often being used in combination with other parasites because of its ability to disable antiviral protection and, in the result of that, “opening gates†for other malicious intruders.
As you may see, there are many types of dangerous files (a list, given in this article, is not full – there are many other, less known categories), which are often able to damage a computer if there is no proper and reliable security installed in it. What is more, sometimes even modern security systems can’t protect your machine from getting infected – in this case following simple security rules (like not opening any files you don’t know or trying not to visit suspicious third-party web sites) can help you in avoiding unwanted consequences and keeping your machine clean from infections.