Anti-Virus & Spyware
First there was the computer, then there was the virus. Viruses can
be traced back to 1982 when Elk Cloner was noted as the first virus
to have spread in the wild. The virus was written for the Apple II
Operating System (OS), by Richard Skrenta, then 15 years old.
We have come a long way since then, in both virus advancements and the technology
to defend our computers from new viruses. Today there are many types of attacks
that could take place against our personal computers. Macro viruses, Trojan
horses, mal-ware and spy-ware are just a few of the ways our computers can
become infected with malicious code. New viruses are discovered nearly every
day. Check out this threat
report by Symantec.
So what can you do to help protect your computer? Easy, buy and INSTALL
some sort of anti-virus software. I say some sort because something
is better than nothing at all, and installing the software is the only
way you are
going to protect your computer. I can’t tell you the number of people
I have helped rid their computers of viruses that had anti-virus software
sitting next to their computer. Having the box next to your computer
isn’t
going to help protect your computer from viruses getting in. There
are many anti-virus products out there. Arguably the two most common
are Norton
AntiVirus by Symantec and VirusScan
Plus by McAfee. I know people who swear by Norton
AntiVirus and people who swear by VirusScan, both are good products
but I am one to recommend Norton AntiVirus, let me tell you why. I
had always felt
Norton AntiVirus was a good robust application that did its job very
well. But what really sold me and convinced me was one day when I was
out on site
at a client’s house. To make a long story short, the client felt they
had a virus on their computer, by the way the computer was behaving,
but didn’t know how the virus was on the computer as she had anti-virus
software, and yes it was installed on the computer. So I show up and
agree that it looks like the work of a virus. So I pop in my Norton
AntiVirus CD
and scan the computer from the CD. After the scan is complete Norton
reports three viruses where found and the infected files have been
cleaned. The anti-virus
software on my clients computer was McAfee’s VirusScan. From this day
on, I have always recommended Norton AntiVirus. Besides this experience,
beginning with their 2006 version, Norton AntiVirus has been able to
also look for, find and remove other malicious code like spy-ware
and ad-ware. This support has only become stronger in their 2007 version.
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Recommendations
Norton AntiVirus
• More
Information
• Download
Free 15 day Trial
Ad-Aware
• Download
Spybot
• Download
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