What to Do When You Have a Computer Virus

It has happened to most computer users from time to time - getting a computer virus on their hard drives

. Mac users may snicker a bit as it is a much less common phenomenon on their systems, but they should not laugh too hard. It is not because they run on a cleaner OS that primarily protects them (although they do), it is because they run on a less popular OS that few malcontents write viruses for (yet). As Macs continue to gain market share, they will find more and more viruses coming their way. The point being that nearly everybody is at risk for contracting a computer virus in the near future.

How does one know when they have a computer virus? There are many symptoms of an infected computer. Examples would be if the hard drive is running abnormally slow, if legitimate files are showing up as corrupted, frequent error messages appearing, or (the obvious one) if your antivirus software pop-ups a warning (make sure that it is your antivirus software issuing the warning and not a fake program that you never installed initially). If it is determined that a virus may be present, this is what to do:

Step 1 - Stop your other tasks. If the virus is rather innocuous, sometimes the immediate inclination is just to continue working around it. This is a bad idea for multiple reasons. First, the longer that the virus is left alone, the more likely it is to imbed itself deeper on the hard drive and cause more damage to more files. Just because it is not obviously doing anything does not mean that it is not doing work itself. Second, more and more viruses are coupled with spyware and whatever is on your machine may become obvious to the watchful eyes of identity thieves. It is best not to run that risk.

Step 2 - Run anti-virus/anti-malware software. Norton, McAfee, Malwarebytes - all of these programs have a good track record for finding and removing most viruses. Let them do a full system scan and see what they turn up. They not only find most computer viruses, but also delete and/or quarantine the infected files to prevent further damage.

Step 3 - Reboot, ensure that the virus did not return. It is not uncommon for a virus to play dead. Many can appear to be successfully deleted only to reinstall themselves when the computer starts up again. Doing a reboot and then re-scanning the computer is a good way to make sure that the virus will not return on its own.

If the virus is still persisting, there is a point where it just becomes more efficient to junk the infected computer. If you have any important files that need to be moved to a new computer, you may want to have a data recovery group do the extraction if you are afraid that doing so yourself could lead to the virus being transported as well. Computer viruses can ruin an individual's day, but by following the steps above, they do not have to be a long term issue.

What to Do When You Have a Computer Virus

By: Scarlett Lila

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