Welcome to this week’s instalment of our IT Security Glossary.
If there are any terms which we have not yet covered, please feel free to get in touch with us and we will be happy to help.
This week, we are continuing with:
Encrypted Virus
This is a very clever Virus, it actually encrypts itself enabling it to be masked from detection by Virus scanners. It will then decrypt itself once it has bypassed the Virus scanner and spreads itself throughout the infected system.
This type of Virus is incredibly difficult to detect as it will constantly change the decryption pattern every time it infects a file.
To keep your system as secure as possible it is important to make sure that your Anti Virus Software is 100% up to date, make sure it is set to scan ALL FILES and ENCRYPTED FILES.
Encryption
This is a most common method to secure data whilst it is being transferred via email, wireless communications, Bluetooth, networks, external hard disks etc.
Encrypting data is a method by where you make a file completely unreadable by scrambling the data; to unlock it you would require an encryption key.
We also protect our Wireless Networks using encryption, this is the same method and we only allow access with an encryption key.
Remember - If your data is sensitive then consider encrypting your files and folders to stop it from ending up in the wrong hands.
EXE
An EXE file is an Executable file. To access an EXE file you would double click its icon. EXE files can also be executed via batch files and scripts, thus they can become infected very quickly.
Some Viruses can be transferred in EXE files via email, but thankfully, today’s email applications will usually block EXE files attachments.
Always use caution, NEVER open an attachment which contains an EXE file, especially if you do not know the sender.
The Glossary will continue next week. In the meantime, should you have any questions, please feel free to contact us!
