Computers in Crisis: New virus threats local and abroad
Paul Harvey
Issue date: 5/13/09 Section: News
The symptoms of Conficker are easy to miss at first. The worm disables auto-update functions and has been known to disable many types of virus and malware protection. Newer variants of the worm include a spam agent which bombard the users with advertisements, and then ransoms the user for a fee to remove it.
"I haven't seen it yet," said Rod Gorduk, an IT specialist for Peninsula College, "we've had more problems with that Antivirus 2009 malware that tricks people into installing it."
Peninsula College computers are updated on a quarterly basis, said Director of Information Technology Services, Steve Baxter. The rollout of updates occurs between class quarters so students and instructors feel less impact from any quirks introduced by patches. Vulnerabilities on PC computers campus wide should have been patched in December following the Fall 08 quarter, given the quarterly update schedule
Although PC has yet to see Conficker, other threats have hit home in recent months.
"Antivirus 2009, Antispyware 2009, all the different variant names of it, has been one of the worst this year," said Corey Johnson, PC graduate and lead engineer at local computer service center CPI Computers. "People don't know how to protect their computers, so when this pops up and offers to protect their computer, they don't know any better. It's actually malware. It'll disable any other antivirus software on the system and then throw pop up advertisements at the user until it's removed. But you can't just uninstall it, you need a tool to remove it. People come to us a lot for simple infections like that."
The best defense against viruses like these is to have an antivirus installed before encountering these malicious programs, and despite the cost of big name antivirus software, there are free alternatives which do just as good, stated Baxter.
"I had one student in here ranting and raving that there were no free antivirus programs and he'd searched all over, then I turned on my workbench computer and showed him AVG free. He quieted down real quick," Baxter said.
"I haven't seen it yet," said Rod Gorduk, an IT specialist for Peninsula College, "we've had more problems with that Antivirus 2009 malware that tricks people into installing it."
Peninsula College computers are updated on a quarterly basis, said Director of Information Technology Services, Steve Baxter. The rollout of updates occurs between class quarters so students and instructors feel less impact from any quirks introduced by patches. Vulnerabilities on PC computers campus wide should have been patched in December following the Fall 08 quarter, given the quarterly update schedule
Although PC has yet to see Conficker, other threats have hit home in recent months.
"Antivirus 2009, Antispyware 2009, all the different variant names of it, has been one of the worst this year," said Corey Johnson, PC graduate and lead engineer at local computer service center CPI Computers. "People don't know how to protect their computers, so when this pops up and offers to protect their computer, they don't know any better. It's actually malware. It'll disable any other antivirus software on the system and then throw pop up advertisements at the user until it's removed. But you can't just uninstall it, you need a tool to remove it. People come to us a lot for simple infections like that."
The best defense against viruses like these is to have an antivirus installed before encountering these malicious programs, and despite the cost of big name antivirus software, there are free alternatives which do just as good, stated Baxter.
"I had one student in here ranting and raving that there were no free antivirus programs and he'd searched all over, then I turned on my workbench computer and showed him AVG free. He quieted down real quick," Baxter said.
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