Computer Security By Charlotte Foster 8P

Computer viruses are small software programs that are designed to spread from one computer to another and to interfere with how a computer works A virus might corrupt or delete data on your computer, use your program to spread itself to other computers, or even erase everything on your hard disk. Some viruses can prevent you from being able to use your computer at all. Some viruses can delete your files on your computer, or even erase everything in your whole hard-drive! Some viruses do nothing harmful at all. There have been many viruses that spread themselves without doing anything dangerous. But they are still known as viruses because they access your computer without consent. When you get a computer virus your computer may get random pop-ups trying to make you download something or sell something to you. It can also spread itself across your P.C files and make it harder for you to remove it. To prevent your computer getting viruses, you should download anti- virus software and scan your files regularly for viruses. Viruses can be disguised as attachments of funny images, greeting cards, or audio and video files.

A hacker is someone who accesses someone else’s computer files and their information without their permission To stop someone from hacking your computer you could install a firewall, which stops them gaining access to your system One easy way to stop your computer from being hacked, is when you are not using it, turn it off or disconnect it from the internet By gaining access to someone else’s data without permission is committing a criminal offence If someone where to hack your account, I could mean big trouble. They can read your private messages, send out spam or make your messages public. There are many famous hackers, one of them us Matthew Anderson, who was jailed for 18 months after he hacked millions of people’s account A firewall prevents unauthorised intrusions into your computer system and controls and allows and only allows authorised access

A back-up is when you copy all of your data to another area such as a memory stick or a CD in case all of your files are deleted. More and more people are using computers to store memories, important documents, other bits of information that may need to be kept for long periods of time. Backing up a computer is essential for keeping documents around. If you are using anything such as a memory stick or CD to back up- your files, make sure they are away from your computer and not left plugged in then whoever gets onto your compter can access it