FILES! FILES! FILES! Wait for it…FILES! With our daily adventures, all your documents, your bookmarks, your precious photos, and unrecoverable videos are saved and documented on to your computer for safe keeping. Because, hey, what can possibly happen to them there? Until one day, you try to download a program you think you need desperately and find yourself with a Trojan Win32 Virus a week later.
That’s what happened to me. Usually I save all my important stuff on my computer and I occasionally back up my data to a separate hard drive. However, I haven’t backed up any data or organized any files lately so if my data was gone, all my life’s work will be too. (Really!)
The program I was trying to download was located on a blog, one that didn’t look professional at all. It just looked like a cluttered blog, no pop-ups, and nothing that was obviously suspicious. After I downloaded the program, I could not find it any where in my programs. Instead, I found it as a file located on my computer. I assumed the download was unsuccessful, deleted the file, and carried on with what I was doing. That was the first sign of the virus, a hidden program installed on my computer.
The next day, I opened up my browser and I noticed my homepage was completely different. I changed my homepage and didn’t look much into why it was there and how it got there. (And, you’d think that I probably would). Soon after, a random “Security Program” popped up saying that there was a threatening virus on my computer that may put my data in danger of being lost. This, I found out was the Trojan Virus’s scamming program that would tell me to pay money to get the virus fixed and then state “All Clear” while its trying to take over my computer.
After that, I ran some security tests and found that I indeed had a Trojan Virus and tried my best to manually remove it through a bunch of online web sources that gave me instructions on how to do so. I backed up all the files I could and started the process. Eventually, I had help from my Dad, but I did what I could. My computer had to be clean, and then restored to factory default. Learned my lesson, back up everywhere and everything, every time you get the chance.
In conclusion, we rely on our technology too much, we need to start creating back up plans for all this stuff, because once you get a virus or cannot recover your files, it won’t be pleasant at all.
That’s what happened to me. Usually I save all my important stuff on my computer and I occasionally back up my data to a separate hard drive. However, I haven’t backed up any data or organized any files lately so if my data was gone, all my life’s work will be too. (Really!)
The program I was trying to download was located on a blog, one that didn’t look professional at all. It just looked like a cluttered blog, no pop-ups, and nothing that was obviously suspicious. After I downloaded the program, I could not find it any where in my programs. Instead, I found it as a file located on my computer. I assumed the download was unsuccessful, deleted the file, and carried on with what I was doing. That was the first sign of the virus, a hidden program installed on my computer.
The next day, I opened up my browser and I noticed my homepage was completely different. I changed my homepage and didn’t look much into why it was there and how it got there. (And, you’d think that I probably would). Soon after, a random “Security Program” popped up saying that there was a threatening virus on my computer that may put my data in danger of being lost. This, I found out was the Trojan Virus’s scamming program that would tell me to pay money to get the virus fixed and then state “All Clear” while its trying to take over my computer.
After that, I ran some security tests and found that I indeed had a Trojan Virus and tried my best to manually remove it through a bunch of online web sources that gave me instructions on how to do so. I backed up all the files I could and started the process. Eventually, I had help from my Dad, but I did what I could. My computer had to be clean, and then restored to factory default. Learned my lesson, back up everywhere and everything, every time you get the chance.
In conclusion, we rely on our technology too much, we need to start creating back up plans for all this stuff, because once you get a virus or cannot recover your files, it won’t be pleasant at all.
xoxo,