There are three ways that you can encounter these rogue scanners; you see an advertisement offering a system tune up or the ad is offering a free virus scan, you click on a website that is fixed to exploit software vulnerabilities, or you get an email that is disguised as a news alert or a greeting card.

How to prevent scareware

This type of software is sometimes delivered through advertising channels that are legitimate and found on various websites.  The best way to prevent an infection from scareware is to disable active scripting that is being fed through a third party website.  Make sure that your anti-virus and anti-spyware that is legitimate is up to date.  Make sure that you read any email you receive in plain text and do not respond to any ads from people you do not know.

How to spot scareware

The most obvious symptom is to get an unexpected virus alert from some product you do not remember installing.  There is a list on line that you can check to see if it a rogue scanner before you download and install new security software or scanner.  Just type rogue scanners in the search box.

Removing scareware

The first thing you need to make sure when you think or know that you have a rogue scanner is to not connect to the internet.  Usually the uninstall file is in the control panel on your computer under the Add/Remove Program option.  Unfortunately the uninstaller usually does not work so hopefully your legitimate anti-virus software can remove the rogue scanner.  If it does not, you may no choice but to go online to find a tool that will specifically remove malware of this type.  Most of these tools are free.

Here are some ways to tell if the virus alert is real.

1. Location-Where the alert is located can have significant bearing on whether it is real or not. If you are seeing repeated warnings or alerts about the infection it could be because you have some type of non-active malware that is trapped in one of the folders from the system restore. It may also be just a remnant trapped in some other spot causing the alert.
2. Origination—where it came from might mean anything such as a high risk origin would mean an attachment in an email or files that are downloaded from some file sharing network. High risk can also include a download that is unexpected that is the result from instant messaging or an email link.
3. Purpose—is the file that is triggering the alert one that you need and expected. Consider a file that is unexpectedly downloaded as high risk and is likely malicious. Be careful about what you run on your computer system is one way to eliminate a virus infection. If you did download it, you need it, but your anti-virus software is still giving you an alert, get another opinion.
4. Second Opinion Scan—if your file makes it pass the first three steps but you are still getting an alert from your anti-virus software, you should upload the suspected file to an online scanner to get a another opinion. Your file will be submitted to several online scanners and if it comes back that some of the scanners say it is infected it more than likely is. If you only get one or two reports that the file is infected it could either be a malware virus that is new and not being detected by many of the scanners or it is a false positive.

These are some of the things that you can do to make sure if your anti-virus software is giving you a false positive or if it is for real. If you did intentionally download the questionable file and do not really need it, you can delete it if you are not sure.

Overwriting Viruses

There are some viruses that can cause certain file to be deleted and even the whole drive contents.  If a user acts fast enough the deleted files may be able to be recovered.  What an overwriting virus does is to use malicious code and over write the original file using the code.  When this happens, the file cannot be recovered because it was replaced or modified.

Ramsomware Trojans

This type of malicious malware will encrypt files on your infected computer and then ask for money in exchange for the decryption key.  The victim is affected in two different ways.  They cannot access their important files and they are a victim of extortion.

Password Stealers

These are Trojan malware that steal login information for networks, systems, email, FTP, games, ecommerce and banking sites.  The attackers can custom configure password stealers after they have infected the system to steal from the email system, and then reconfigure it to steal from an online site.  Although games are the most talked about target they are not the most common target.

Backdoors

This type of malware Trojans provide surreptitious and remote access to an infected system which is like having the hacker sitting at your computer keyboard.  This type of Trojan can let the attacker do any action that you do.  In addition, the attacker can install other malware on your computer.

Rookits and Bookits

The attacker will have full access to your computer system with a rootkit and will usually hide in registry edits, files, folders, and any other components it uses.  It can also hide other malicious malware in addition to hiding itself.  With a bookit malware it will infect flash BIOs.  When you combine it with a rootkit functionality it becomes a hybrid and is hard to detect and remove.

Keyloggers

This is a malicious Trojan malware that monitors your keystrokes.  The attacker takes this information and puts them into a file and then sends this file off to remote attackers.  You can even purchase keylogger software which parents can use to record their children’s online activities.  With keylogger malware it can monitor all keystrokes or it can be set up to monitor a specific activity.

The definition for spyware is that it is any type of software that is malicious and collects personal information.  Once it has been downloaded and installed on your PC it can do two things which are sitting quietly collecting your user names, passwords, and account number, or the configuration of your computer can be changed.  When configuration is changed it will let a hacker access your computer even though you are protected by any security software or firewall which is a good  identity theft protection practice.

Sometimes it is hard to spot spyware which can make it hard to control. There are some spyware programs that can be disguise so well that your computer can be infected and you not know it.  This is rare because most computers that are infected with spyware will have at least one indication that alerts you to infection from spyware.
Some of these symptoms include:

• You have windows that pop up continually open even as you shut them.
• When you type a Web address in your address bar you are directed to another one instead.
• You start to see new toolbars appearing in your browser that are not expected.
• You suddenly have an unexpected home page change and cannot put it back to the original one.
• You suddenly start to get random error messages from Windows without any type of explanation.
• When you try to open programs or process tasks like saving files your computer operations slow down a lot.

The one way you can find out for certain if you have an infected computer is to run a scan with an anti-spyware program that is much like anti-virus software.  Once you download an anti-spyware program you can just set it up to scan all your files on a daily basis.  Make sure that you get an anti-spyware that is up to date or else it will do no good to download one.

If you spend any amount of time online the most dangerous threat to your identity theft and computer is from spyware so make sure that you take the time to download good anti-spyware software to prevent this from happening.

One way is that once it has infected your computer it may automatically use your address book and send out emails to your contacts containing the virus.  This particular type of computer virus is called a worm.  The reason that it is called a worm is that this virus is a self propagating virus.

If the virus is attached to a Microsoft Word document it could attaché itself to any other document you create or modify using that program.  When you send another document using that program the virus goes along with it.

Sometimes you will get an e-card which is actually a virus masquerading itself as something fun and will secretly infect your computer.  You like the e-card so much you decide to send some from the same site to your friends and family along with the virus.

Another type of computer virus is called a Trojan Horse which is related to a computer virus and the only difference is that a Trojan Horse will not attempt to replicate themselves.  A Trojan Horse will perform some unwanted action intentionally while it is pretending to be doing something else.  An example of a Trojan Horse would be a fake login program.  This fake login program will collect account information and passwords just like a legitimate login program.

Many computer viruses can lock up the entire computer system or erase your files.  Some are less malicious and do not do any direct damage other than spreading throughout the internet.  Some of the more malicious computer viruses can delete all your documents, reformat your hard drive, release confidential personal information such as credit card information, passwords, or account numbers by sending it via email to the address of the virus writer.

Some of the viruses will change security settings to allow a hacker to get into your computer without you being aware of it so they can steal information or even plant monitoring software on your computer.