Computer virus preventiona primer

Short Description
Computer virus prevention:a primer. Jan Hruska, Sophos Plc, Oxford, England. First published: August 2000. SUMMARY. This white paper describes the current …

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. 2000 Sophos Plc. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publishers.
Computer virus prevention: a primer
Jan Hruska, Sophos Plc, Oxford, England
First published: August 2000
SUMMARY
This white paper describes the current virus situation, common virus entry points,
procedures for preventing infection, types of anti-virus software, deployment and
administration of anti-virus software, and measures for recovering from a virus
attack.
Viruses today
The number of known viruses surpassed 50,000 in August 2000. A large majority of
those (74%) are parasitic viruses (attacking executables), second are macro viruses
(19%) and 7% are boot sector viruses. In May 2000 88% of infections reported to Sophos
were due to macro viruses, 9% due to parasitic viruses and only 3% due to boot sector
viruses. Note that a reported infection is counted as a single unit regardless of whether
the virus infected one machine or 10,000 machines: the statistics quoted are not “bombproof”
but simply an indication of what is out there.
The number of new viruses discovered every month continues to increase. In…