Windows 7 Viral Breakdown – Redmondmag.com (blog)
Windows 7 Viral Breakdown
As soon as the virus warning popped up I knew I was hosed. While the warning looked real enough, it sure wasn't from Symantec. I've been there before and knew I had little chance of licking this horror.
I immediately started a full Symantec scan and during those two hours fake alerts popped up with torturous regularity. Symantec found and removed two Trojans. That only made things worse. At that point the whole machine what locked down.
I've been hit by variations of this varmint for over a decade, though it most often struck my kid's PCs (which is why they all have Macs now). While the fundamentals are the same, hackers change the code just enough so antivirus software can't keep up.
I've been pretty kind to Microsoft for its efforts to patch and protect its software. Turns out I've been too nice. It is unacceptable for a 25-year-old operating system like Windows to be taken down so easily. Equally unacceptable is the leading antivirus tool being so inept at blocking what is, in reality, a very old virus.
What say you? Spout off at dbarney@redmondmag.com.
Here on some tips on disinfecting your sick PC.
Posted by Doug Barney on 06/20/2011 at 12:43 PM
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