I have been debating what my next topic should be and as I was looking over different items I kept getting asked by different people this question. And my definitive answer is… it depends. The biggest factor here is WHAT part of your computer is telling you this? Was it your antivirus software? (You ARE running antivirus software right?) There are plenty of free for home use (my favorites here are Avast! Free Home Edition or AVG Free Antivirus) or minimal cost options (I prefer Eset NOD32 because it has a low impact on your system performance). There are also the “commercially recognized” options such as McAfee or Norton though I tend to not recommend either of those two options as much as I used to because they started to head towards a “swiss army knife” solution and take care of ALL your potential problems and in the process became hulking behemoths that ended up slowing your system down so much that they became a nuisance. This shouldn’t detract from their effectiveness and if you have a newer computer system then this system resource “hogging” shouldn’t be too noticeable. Add to that the fact the in recent reviews both have been given much better overall scores and claims they aren’t quite so bulky on your system, along with how common they are since one or the other seems to come with any new system you purchase. The bottom line, pick ONE of them and keep it updated and ensure it is running in the background and protecting you.
OK, that was quite a sidestep from where I was initially heading with that statement, but an important one. So if it is one of those known (i.e. “trusted”) programs that is telling you of a possible infection, then listen to it, read what the report is telling you, and make sure the problem has been resolved or do a full system scan. Most of those applications will tell you an infection was found and has already been dealt with, but make sure that is the case. If not launch your previously installed antivirus and tell it to do a full system scan (each one is slightly different in how you launch this, but shouldn’t be too arcane to figure out how to lauch, if not a quick Google search should help with it.)
If it WASN’T your antivirus program of choice, and instead a notice shows up while you were surfing the internets and offers you a “free” scan, then be VERY wary. NEVER blindly click the link they give you and believe in their “You have 431 infections that we can help clear up for you. For a minimal fee of <insert monetary amount here> we can remove these infections.” Quite often those “free scans” are just their first step into gaining your trust so when you are informed of how many infections they found you are willing to give your credit card info over to them in the hopes they’ll take care of them for you.
So the bottom line is only trust programs YOU know that have been setup beforehand when told about an infection, you can never be too cautious in this regard and if you are already infected, then surfing to different websites to try to clean up an infection is definitely not the preferred method. An infected machine is a machine open to further attacks and could just compound the problem. Next time around I think we’ll explore the differences between VIRUSES and SPYWARE (or GRAYWARE as some refer to it). So be smart, be safe, and happy surfing!
Greg