What is a worm vs virus?

It occurs to me that I don't really know the difference between a virus, a worm, or a trojan.

I looked at the FAQ, but did not find the answer.

Jerry

 

you might look here for the answer

bigc

 

Thanks, Bigc.

I figured it would be defined somewhere.

I guess it is a little confusing why an AV will not be sufficient for worms also. Evidently one needs a program for each to have the necessary protection. I suppose there is some overlap.

Jerry

 

There is some overlap but a dedicated av/at or worm remover is a very good idea. I really believe that a layered defence is the way to go.

bigc

 

Viruses - A virus is a small piece of software that piggybacks on real programs. For example, a virus might attach itself to a program such as a spreadsheet program. Each time the spreadsheet program runs, the virus runs, too, and it has the chance to reproduce (by attaching to other programs) or cause serious problems.
E-mail viruses - E-mail virus moves around in e-mail messages, and usually replicates itself by automatically mailing itself to dozens of people in the victim's e-mail address book.
Worms - A worm is a small piece of software that uses computer networks and security holes to replicate itself. A copy of the worm scans the network for another machine that has a specific security hole. It copies itself to the new machine using the security hole, and then starts replicating from there, as well.
Trojan horses - A Trojan horse is simply a computer program. The program claims to do one thing (it may claim to be a game) but instead does damage when you run it (and may erase your hard disk). Trojan horses viruses have no way to replicate automatically.
Also you will find that downloaded games off the internet are full of these types of trojan viruses! So beware of Yahoo!!!

 

from Symantec Security Response:
http://securityresponse.symantec.com/avcenter/venc/data/wormvsvirus.html

 

Thanks.
I am glad that I don't do games. I had heard that they are dangerous, and also some of the music sites are full of spyware.

I guess that most of us cannot understand why someone gets pleasure out of spreading these things to others and causing much damage and time to be spent getting rid of them. But, then we don't understand child molesters either.

No doubt layering protection is a necessary thing.

Jerry

 

I agree with you JerryM.

I can even show you some sites which are infested with adware and trojans. But I won't, its not worth the risk to put someone into danger. I don't understand why they do this either...my guess is the spyware guys pay them cartloads of money for doing the same, this way they can keep their website going and they probably think that since the spyware does not destroy data on your PC its a good trade off as they are not affected and can continue their service. This is only my view.

Regards,
Firecat

 

JerryM,

consider the case with child molesters. They are usually people who are socially rejected b'coz of bad habits or some other reason. Such people might have a 'desperate' state of mind and therefore they may try to take advantage of children, b'coz when kids venture into something new (out of the scope of what they'd normally do), they hardly know what they're doing until the results are seen and its way too late.

Its the same with these guys I guess, b'coz not everybody has KAV, McAfee or a KAV clone and not everybody has BOClean, Adaware, Spybot etc. installed alongside their antivirus. The users would never know they have spyware until they see what is spyware and investigate whether they've got the symptoms or not.

Its the same case; it could be too late. It has already infected your computer and you may be having your data mined and sent to a server on a daily basis. Then you see, your CD keys for games and software have become invalid. Its too late.

These guys only care about their website; only about how they should 'take revenge' on their provider for charging extra for web space by sending viruses and blaming the provider for them....overall its the innocent guy who is cheated.

Just my 2 cents. Sorry if I agitated you.

Best Regards,
Firecat

 

No agitation at all.
Haave a goog day and keep your computer clean.


Jerry

 

JerryM,

You have a nice day too!