MEGA BAD VIRUS (MOST Serious)

Anyone-using Internet mail such as Yahoo, Hotmail, AOL and so on.  This information arrived this morning, Direct from both Microsoft and Norton.  Please send it to everybody you know who has Access to the Internet. You may receive an apparently harmless e-mail titled:

Here you have it, Here it is, Just for you ~ etc.

If you open the file, a message will appear on your screen saying: "It is too late now, your life is no longer beautiful....'

Subsequently you will LOSE EVERYTHING IN YOUR PC.  And the person who sent it to you will gain access to your Name, e-mail and password.  This is a new virus which started to circulate on Saturday afternoon.  AOL has already confirmed the severity, and the antivirus software's are not capable of destroying it.

The virus has been created by a hacker who calls himself 'life owner'.

PLEASE SEND A COPY OF THIS E-MAIL TO ALL YOUR FRIENDS,

And ask them to PASS IT ON IMMEDIATELY!

THIS HAS BEEN CONFIRMED BY SNOPES. http://www.snopes.com/computer/virus/hereyouhave.asp

What is the difference between antivirus and anti spyware software (high level)?

A common misconception is that Macs/Apples are free or have a low threshold of infection – did you know that in 1982 by Richard Skrenta, it attached itself to the Apple DOS 3.3 operating system and spread by floppy disk This virus was originally a joke, created by a high school student and put onto a game on floppy disk. On its 50th use the Elk Cloner virus would be activated, infecting the computer and displaying a short poem beginning "Elk Cloner: The program with a personality".

Spyware Software is malicious software or code that tracks and reports what you do and can by its nature put a load on your system or a footprint that bogs down your system while reporting back to some third person information about you. This information can be as simple as your browser settings and screen resolution or as detailed as your email, files on your computer or any keystroke thus any transaction including financial that you do on a system.

ViralVirus Software is intended to corrupt your system in some way either by slowing down your software processes or destroying data.

Bottom line is both are bad as such you should have either a combination program that covers both but the ideal scenario are two programs tasked to specifically deal with each unique threat to the integrity of your operating system or data working in tandem but separate from the other.

Anti spyware software looks for any errant program or data that behaves in such a way that indicates it may be sending data to a remote person and removes it.

Anti virus software looks for any errant program or data that may corrupt your software and the integrity of your operating system and works to either isolate or remove it.

On the surface they seem like they are the same and to some extend you are right because there is some minor overlap. That aside these products serve two different purposes. Both do this using heuristics (educated guesses and/or intuitive judgments ) and both typically depends on constant information updates from the author of the programs to keep track of new threats.