Stopping Malware Dead in It's Tracks

There are reasons computers get infected with malware and viruses. Most of those reasons have one common cause: user stupidity.

So, you got a new computer or notebook and you can't wait to try it out the internet. STOP. That brand new computer (and all of your older ones) are not ready for the internet right off the shelf. It doesn't matter what operating system you use. Whether it's Windows, Apple, a Chromebook or any Linux flavor, you need to set up user accounts first. If you don't. and you head out to the internet as the admin user, you are a sitting duck for a malware or virus infection.

Take the time to set up limited user accounts. This will ensure that anything you download cannot write to the operating system folders and files, but only to the user folders.

In Windows and on an Apple computer, you can set up user accounts (do not give the user accounts admin privileges). Look in the control panel for user administration. In Linux, use the system commands for your distribution (usually useradd).

If you need help locating the control panel to make a limited user account, here are some instructions for Windows users.

ALWAYS use your user account, not the admin or root account, to browse the internet. Make sure all your accounts are password protected. And make sure your firewall is also turned on.

If you do run into a problem, shut the machine down, reboot, and log in using the admin account. If the issue is really bad, you should be able to grab most, if not all, of your personal files via the admin account (use a thumb drive). DO NOT, under any circumstance, download your web browser cache. Typically, this is the first point of entry for malware.

Keeping your important files backed up is also highly recommended.

There's a page here that gives some tips on how to remove basic web browser malware Fix Web Browser Bugs. But if the problem is worse than that you can also try software like MalwareBytes.

If you are not successful in removing the malware, then, after you've grabbed any important files (while in the admin account you can browse other users' folders), the next best move is to simply delete the user files, and if you must, also delete the affected user account. Make a new (limited) user account, reboot the machine, and log into that one instead. If it is a serious problem, I'd highly recommend that you do delete the affected account.

If you can remove the hard drive and access it via another machine without booting into it, then deleting suspect files and folders is also easy. However, on Windows, do not delete the user account except while you are logged in as the admin user with the affected system running.

Other Tips

Never open attachments in your email if you do not know or trust the sender.

Keep pop-ups turned off in your web browsers. Most modern browsers have pop-ups turned off by default, don't turn them back on. Pop-ups from ad farms can be infected with malware and it downloads to your machine when you land on a page that contains one of those scripts.

Virus scanners are helpful but not an end all in themselves. In fact, good malware is written to masquerade as virus software. Just something to keep in mind.