This week was an interesting week… Just wanted to write this week about a sudden rash of computer viruses we have been seeing. We have had a number of clients hit with this virus recently and you don’t want to be next so pay close attention.
There is a newer virus going around that appears to have several different strains, some not as bad as others but they all have one thing in common. When a user is infected with this virus they were browsing their favorite website at the time. I have heard users getting infected with this from doing their normal Facebooking, YouTube, etc. So…there is no defined website that users are getting this from.
When a user is infected it causes all icons on the desktop and the start menu to “disappear” (Basically it hides everything). The virus in some stains delete all of a user’s programs from their start menu folders, and opens a door for other infections to enter. All of the infections I’ve seen so far make fake errors stating that you are having a hard drive error. If you notice any of the above shut your computer down immediately and bring it in and we can take a look at it. In some cases if the infection has not progressed too far damage can be reversed. In most cases however the user waits too long and there is too much damage caused for it to make sense to just do a virus removal and users end up having to format their machine and reinstall everything. Don’t get too worked up if you do get this virus, either way we can save your data, pictures, etc.
One note, it has been noted that this virus appears to come into computers via unpatched Adobe Flash and Java components so make sure you are keep them up to date to try to prevent this from happening to you.
