Spring Break
Differences between spyware, viruses common misconception
Alex Lawson
Issue date: 9/25/07 Section: News
As students become more and more dependent on computers to carry out daily tasks, it is important to know how to keep them safe from viruses and spyware.
It's a misconception that viruses and spyware are the same thing. Badri Rajagopalan, assistant to the director of the college of arts and sciences information technology team, explained the difference.
"Viruses are not typically designed to steal your information, Spyware is meant to steal your information," Rajagopalan said. "Viruses are typically for fun or other purposes."
Both viruses and spyware can come disguised as harmless things and can thus be very deceptive.
"They typically call them Trojans. They essentially tell you they're something else and you go to a site to download something and it turns out to be a virus or a spyware," Rajagopalan said.
Rajagopalan went on to explain that spyware is the more malicious of the two as it breeds more of itself.
"Spyware keeps getting worse just because of the fact that one spyware typically goes and downloads other spyware, so it compounds the problem and after that a lot of your applications start working and you start having lots of other problems," Rajagopalan said.
Liam Doherty, service manager of Techzone in the Bone Student Center, advised that there are certain trends he observes when students bring their computers that have been infected with viruses or spyware.
"What we've seen the most of this fall is generic pop-ups and junk," Doherty said. "A lot of it comes from these sites that do P2P (person to person) traffic."
Doherty added that the most prevalent program that has given students problems is the file sharing database Limewire, and that avoiding problems with viruses and spyware are easily avoided by monitoring your online activity.
"I guess good steps to take would be to avoid downloading programs or malicious sites that you don't know where they came from or what they're doing," Doherty said.
Doherty admitted that this would not make your computer completely immune to viruses and spyware, but that it is a very strong way to avoid it.
Every ISU student who lives in the residence halls has to register their Internet connection with Resnet, and in doing so they are equipped with the McAfee anti virus software which is highly recommended by Techzone.
"The entire campus has a site license with McAfee, so we use that on all the computers we have," Doherty said.
"We highly recommend it because it's a free product, it's a full version that doesn't expire, and it's free for anyone associated with the university."
It's a misconception that viruses and spyware are the same thing. Badri Rajagopalan, assistant to the director of the college of arts and sciences information technology team, explained the difference.
"Viruses are not typically designed to steal your information, Spyware is meant to steal your information," Rajagopalan said. "Viruses are typically for fun or other purposes."
Both viruses and spyware can come disguised as harmless things and can thus be very deceptive.
"They typically call them Trojans. They essentially tell you they're something else and you go to a site to download something and it turns out to be a virus or a spyware," Rajagopalan said.
Rajagopalan went on to explain that spyware is the more malicious of the two as it breeds more of itself.
"Spyware keeps getting worse just because of the fact that one spyware typically goes and downloads other spyware, so it compounds the problem and after that a lot of your applications start working and you start having lots of other problems," Rajagopalan said.
Liam Doherty, service manager of Techzone in the Bone Student Center, advised that there are certain trends he observes when students bring their computers that have been infected with viruses or spyware.
"What we've seen the most of this fall is generic pop-ups and junk," Doherty said. "A lot of it comes from these sites that do P2P (person to person) traffic."
Doherty added that the most prevalent program that has given students problems is the file sharing database Limewire, and that avoiding problems with viruses and spyware are easily avoided by monitoring your online activity.
"I guess good steps to take would be to avoid downloading programs or malicious sites that you don't know where they came from or what they're doing," Doherty said.
Doherty admitted that this would not make your computer completely immune to viruses and spyware, but that it is a very strong way to avoid it.
Every ISU student who lives in the residence halls has to register their Internet connection with Resnet, and in doing so they are equipped with the McAfee anti virus software which is highly recommended by Techzone.
"The entire campus has a site license with McAfee, so we use that on all the computers we have," Doherty said.
"We highly recommend it because it's a free product, it's a full version that doesn't expire, and it's free for anyone associated with the university."
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