Preventing Computer Viruses
Viruses (Macro viruses)
- Attach themselves to other programs (documents) and spread when the programs are executed (the files are opened)
Worms
- Special type of virus that spread itself without human intervention (copies itself from computer to computer)
Anti-virus software packages
- Check disks and files to ensure that they are virus-free
Incoming e-mail messages
- Most common source of viruses
- Attachments to e-mails to be checked for viruses
- Use of filtering programs that ‘clean’ incoming e-mail