Viruses come in many forms

Security is something we talk about often in the office and the reason it’s become a topic again is due to some new malware which has been spotted.

Named Rombertik, this particular piece of malware is nasty. Once it’s on your PC it clings to your internet browser and collects data, just like some other viruses. The difference is the damage it can do when it’s found by your anti-virus.
Your anti-virus can usually clean any viruses it finds, malware or spyware it finds in its scans and everything continues as normal. However, once spotted Rombertik will damage the information your PC uses to start up as well as other possibly important data on your hard drive which will mean that anything you have on there could potentially be lost.

How does it get there?

Mainly through human error (so to speak). The easiest way for someone to get a virus on to your PC is to trick you into putting it there, and the most common way for them to do this is to send you an email with a malicious attachment.

What can I do?

Check your email carefully. A few things to look at are:-

• Who is it from?
  Be wary of the sender. Links and attachments from an unknown sender may be malicious, tread carefully!
• What is it about?
  Is it asking you to log in to a service to amend your password for ‘security reasons’? Is your bank asking you for details? These emails could be fake!
• Is there an attachment?
  What is being sent with the email, if you don’t know the company and they are sending you invoices they could be fake and/or harmful.
• What type of file is attached?
  Viruses can be hidden in just about any file type and if you’re not expecting anyone to send you a file it could be malicious, but there are some more obvious file types to look for which are: .EXE .ZIP .RAW
• Is there a link?
  Is the email asking you to follow a link to a document or a page? Chances are they could be sending you to a website which is infected.

These aren’t set rules on how to be safe but they are things to consider the next time you get an email from Martha Smith (jade.doe@fAlsENaMe.lOCalBank.fake) insisting you have a £17.64 invoice outstanding which you need to view and pay immediately.

Finally make sure your anti-virus is up to date as this is the best way to remain protected.