Security: Is There Ever Enough...

In these days of eye-popping technology, there is a vein of dark, damaging, destructive behavior that runs from mischievous to causing irreparable damage to others’ property. And the perpetrators? They are “hackers” that play nasty little tricks just to be annoying; destroy another’s computer; or take lives away by stealing identities and money. Some internet schemes are so clever that inexperienced or beginning “netters” are easily taken in by seemingly legitimate advertisements, offers, or announcements through their email services and are referred to as malware, adware, or spyware,.
These threats come in the form of viruses, Trojans, worms, hoaxes, and urban legends. Wikipedia defines a virus as an unwanted program which becomes installed and spreads other programs on a computer by adding extra lines of code; in this way the virus not only “infects” the programs on a specific computer but can also infect other computers. These viruses can slow the performance of the computer, cause strange behaviors such as re-routing pathways to unwanted sites, and/or do extensive damage to the computer, even to the extent of rendering a unit totally useless. (I have personally experienced this type of loss). A worm is described as being similar to a virus in that it can spread throughout a computer’s database to other programs and infect other computers, though it doesn’t add extra code. Trojan horses are programs which conceal their true purpose; usually functions not desirable to users.
Walt Howe (Walt Howe’s Internet Learning Center), a class reading, and David Emery (About.com) describe variable hoaxes. Hoaxes, as stated by Emery, have “one purpose—to spread to as many people as possible.” Urban Legends are in a similar class with hoaxes. Both hoaxes and urban legends take the form of chain letters, “warm, fuzzy, feel-good” stories, donation, investment, get-rich-quick, and pyramid schemes.
Howe and Emery suggest that if a person “feels” that an email message or advertisement is too good to be true—it probably is. Both authors strongly recommend that before forwarding these types of messages on to others or “buying in” to them, that an individual verify and ascertain that the information is correct and factual. These authors suggest sites such as Hoaxbusters, Incident Advisory Committee, and Symantec Anti-Virus Research Center to verify correct or factual information.
References
Hoaxbusters.http://antivirus.about.com/gi/dynamic/offsite.htm?site=http://hoaxbusters.ciac.org/HoaxBustersHome.html
Howe, W. (2001). Hoax detection.https://myasucourses.asu.edu/webapps/portal/frameset.jsp?tab=courses&url=/bin/common/course.pl?course_id=_565287_1
Howe, W. (2001). HOAXES AND URBAN LEGENDShow to hoax-proof yourself.https://myasucourses.asu.edu/webapps/portal/frameset.jsp?tab=courses&url=/bin/common/course.pl?course_id=_565287_1
Howe, W. (2001). Sympathy hoaxes andwarm fuzzy stories.https://myasucourses.asu.edu/webapps/portal/frameset.jsp?tab=courses&url=/bin/common/course.pl?course_id=_565287_1
Howe, W. (2006). Privacy.https://myasucourses.asu.edu/webapps/portal/frameset.jsp?tab=courses&url=/bin/common/course.pl?course_id=_565287_1
Wikipedia--internet security.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internet_security