The Ultimate Guide To Have A Virus Free Computer

How can we avoid computer viruses? Would our anti-virus be enough to assure us that we could be computer virus free? I don't think so, of course those viruses are made to bypass your security system your anti virus included. I had a software engineer friend back in college days, and he was planning to release a computer virus that would infect our university's computer database (I really don't know what is his intention). The one test he conducts before he would launch the virus is testing it first on his computer's anti virus. If his virus is undetectable, he would launch it, otherwise, he would revise it.

I know fake ones are cheap but the security you would be getting would be cheap too. The choice of protection from malwares starts in the basic decision of buying a genuine OS (operating system). A legitimate OS has a great advantage against fake ones. There are important updates that can only be obtained by authentic OS users, wherein if a copied OS tries the update it would be detected as not genuine. That would be pretty shameful.

If you already have an antivirus, do update it as often as possible. An outdated antivirus is pretty scary for a very cautious person. New computer viruses being developed every day, in fact, there are such claims that thousands are being produced each day.
Another kind of update is your own operating system updates. Microsoft releases updates at least once a month. This contains valuable updates that enhance your system’s security features. Now, this is where the genuine operating system comes in order to play. There are some important updates you cannot do if your OS is a fake. So there you would see a big hole in your security against malwares. Furthermore, an updated OS would be less damage by certain viruses compared to an outdated OS. Since, when you update your operating system you slightly change the architecture of your system. A virus or a malware that is said to work to certain system architecture would find it hard to rick havoc if it would be unfamiliar to the terrain. One of the best ways to be safe from those infamous malwares currently out is to perform a hundred percent update or what we call system “upgrade”. What do I mean? If your operating system right now is Microsoft Windows Vista, buy the latest Microsoft Windows 7 (or maybe wait for the upcoming Windows 8). I performed an experiment on how important upgrading the OS of the computer is. It is entitled Computer’s OS Virus Crash Test.

Download anti virus softwares, this is your defense against those computer viruses roaming in the Internet. There are free anti virus softwares out there. The three most known are Avira, AVG and Avast. I also recommend downloading Malwarebytes. So it would be the anti virus of your choice plus Malwarebytes. I heard many positive reviews about this software. It is known to detect the viruses that most anti virus fails to detect.

You can monitor your system using the task manager. There you would find once there are some strange programs running inside your system. If there is something quite unfamiliar running in the process tab, you might want to check it out in the Internet. Searching the name of the process would help you determine if it is a virus or not. Furthermore, a handy indicator in the task manager is the CPU usage tab. If your CPU usage is shooting towards one hundred percent in idle condition (idle meaning no application or software, plainly your desktop on view), then you might have some serious virus infection. (How to Avoid Malwares Using the Task Manager)

Be careful on the website you go to.  Stay away from nasty websites. Don’t make excuses that you have a pretty strong antivirus installed on your system. Do not rely too much on antivirus, they do not detect all malwares. An antivirus that can detect all malwares is merely an ideal one. Some websites may look friendly and harmless at first. However, you would find out that there would be some Ads popping out of your browser.  Do not click it. Just close it out or might as well close your whole browser using the task manager. I encountered once a pop-up ad, that says free scan for malwares. I closed it but still it performed a whole computer scan. It says it detected a thousand malwares in my system (yeah right) , then it offers a software to remove all those malwares. The software is not free, but if you would not buy the software the “malware notification” thing will plague your system. The malware notification, the system scans, and the virus removal software offered are all viruses. All I can do was back up my files and reformat my system.

If you are to download anything, mostly something that is offered free. Don’t quickly press the “download now button”. You will never know you might be downloading a certain virus or often a Trojan.  Look at the comment box at first, how people rate it and what do they say about the link. If the link is good you would be reading positive reviews if not, then you would find the word “it’s a virus”.

Disable this, because it is one of the effective ways for computer virus to infiltrate your system. It can be done using a software or the REGEDIT function.(Disabling Autorun - How and Why)

This is one good advice. I usually install programs in drive C and store all my files in the other drive (drive E). If a certain virus corrupts my drive C, all my files in drive E would be safe. You can either use the other drive as back-up files or mainly the storage drive. Many viruses are programmed to attack directly the C drive since it is the default drive.