ABCs of
malicious programs
ABCs of malicious programs:
You must have heard about malicious programs infecting the system. Let us
first understand what malicious programs are before getting into the ABCs of
malicious programs. Malicious programs or malware is a software or program
that is designed for affecting a computer without the knowledge of the
person who uses it. These malicious programs include computer viruses,
Trojans, worms, spyware, hacker utilities, etc.
Worms:
Let us discuss about network worms. Wondering what these network worms are?
They are normally promulgated or transmitted through the internet or LAN.
Main objective or aims of these network worms are to instigate a fresh copy
on the systems and to spread these to other systems in the network.
Penetration of worms is achieved through e-mail, instant messaging, LAN,
WAN, file sharing, etc. Beware that even through an attachment in the
e-mail, these worms spread. Similarly, through ICQ or IRC messages also
worms spread rapidly.
There are certain worms called fileless or packet worms. They get this name
as they are spread as network packets. When the code is executed, they
unswervingly attack the RAM.
These worms spread not only through e-mail attachments but also through
networks that are weakly connected and vulnerabilities that are present in
the operating system and applications.
Viruses:
A network resource is not essential for a virus to spread. Worms may
sometime carry viruses and wipe out the data in an infected system. This
category of malware or malicious program is spread completely in a single
system. The main objective of this malware is to carry out a particular code
in order to achieve a chosen goal. It does not get spread to other systems
provided the following are not done:
a) No other user have access to the resources of this infected system
b) User of the infected system is not sending any e-mail attachment to
others
c) No removable media like floppy disk, CD, etc., used in this system are
utilized by other uninfected system
Trojans:
Is your system malfunctioning or people complain of receiving spam messages
from you? This might be due to Trojans. Without your knowledge, these
malicious programs perform actions like sending out spam messages, gathering
important data from your system and sending them to cyber criminals,
alteration of the existing data or the capabilities of the system are used
for various criminal activities or malicious purposes.
Hacker utilities:
These are nothing but constructors that are used to create malicious
programs or malware like viruses, worms and Trojans. These files are usually
encrypted so that they escape from the eyes of antivirus software. They also
try to give the user wrong information about the actions performed in the
system. They are designed in such a way that they affect the systems in the
network either directly or indirectly.