“Viruses are programs which are written deliberately to damage data”. Assinale a alternativa que apresenta a interpretaç...

Computer Viruses The Maltese Amoeba may sound like a cartoon character, but if it attacked your computer, you wouldn't be laughing. The Maltese Amoeba is a computer virus. It is a form of software which can infect your system and destroy your data. Making computer viruses is only one type of computer crime. Others include hacking (changing data in a computer without permission) and pirating (illegally copying software programs). Viruses are programs which are written deliberately to damage data. Viruses can hide themselves in a computer system. Some viruses are fairly harmless. They may flash a message. The Yankee Doodle virus plays an American tune every eight days at 5 p.m. Others have serious effects. They attach themselves to the operating system and can wipe out all your data. Most viruses remain dormant until activated by something. For example, the Jerusalem B virus is activated every Friday the 13th and erases any file you try to load from your disk. The Michelangelo virus was programmed to become active on March 6 1992, the 517th birthday of Michelangelo. It attacked computer systems throughout the world, turning data on hard disks into nonsense. Viruses are most commonly passed via disks but they can also spread through bulletin boards, local area networks, and email attachments. The best form of treatment is prevention. Use an antivirus program to check a floppy before using it. Always download email attachments onto a floppy and check for viruses. If you do catch a virus, there are antivirus programs to hunt down and eradicate the virus. The problem is that around 150 new viruses appear every month and you must constantly update your antivirus package to deal with these new forms.