Page 18 - Computer Class 05

A computer virus is a small software program that

can spread from one computer system to another and
cause interferences with computer operations.

A computer virus has the capacity to corrupt or to

delete data on your computer and it can use an e-
mail program to spread the virus to other e-mail

addresses in your online address book. It can even
delete everything on your hard disk.

Effects of Computer Virus

8 It might change the power rating of our computer and could blast the
system.

8 It can slow down our computer.

8 It might corrupt our system files.

8 It might make some programs faulty or corrupted.

8 It might damage the boot sector creating problems when we boot into the
windows.

8 It might steal important information from our computer and send to some

other person.
What Viruses Cannot Do?

8 Viruses that infect DOS, do not infect Windows computer software and vice

versa. For example, the Melissa virus incident of late 1998 and the
ILOVEYOU virus of 2000 worked only on Windows based machines and

could not operate on Macintosh computers.
8 Viruses do not infect compressed files, unless the file was infected prior to

the compression. Compressed files are programs or files with its common
characters. removed to take up less space on a disk.

8 Viruses do not infect computer hardware, such as monitors or computer

chips; they only infect software.
Symptoms of a Computer Virus

The computer may be infected if we recognise any of these malware symptoms.

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