Some computer viruses are straight forward to clean, others are tenacious and then you have the Royal Pain In The Butt computer viruses.
Recently, we have noticed a marked trend towards malicious computer virus infections. Some computer viruses are happy to use your computer or laptop as a host for sending spam, others steal your contacts, others attempt to steal your identity and bank details etc.
Last week we had a battle royal with a previously unseen computer virus that defied all normal attempts to clean and remove.
It’s a variation on what is known as the Encryption Virus but this time it’s a much harder nut to crack. If it is not possible to remove a virus from a computer cleanly (some turn septic during the cleaning process), then a fresh Windows build followed by a data transfer is the ultimate solution.
However the Encryption Virus is a particularly foul in that it encrypts EVERY file on the victim’s hard drive. This means that even when you copy the user’s files to a brand new Window’s installation, the files are locked, encrypted and totally useless.
I believe the asking price from the virus developer for unlocking the data is £150 to £200!!
We bang on about how vital a three generation backup strategy is and this is exactly why. Alas, as is the case with most consumers, they are not backed up.
In one case, we managed to retrieve a picture (file) from a digital camera and use that to decrypt the key by comparing the file from the camera with the encrypted file on the hard drive. That client was very very lucky as the hard drive contained the only digital photographs of their children.
Bullguard the internet security that we use and recommend comes with 5GB of online backup so really there is no excuse for not being protected with a backup.
If you are having computer problems, need some computer help or think that your computer has virus, then pop in for a chat. Our advice is free!
