This is just a brief rundown for those of you that don’t have a clue about technology. I have seen many computers come through my office over the past few years. What most “Inexperienced” technicians don’t know is that most of the “Quick Fixes” for Spyware, and Viruses are exactly what they seem to be… Temporary! When you get a virus think of it like a piece of paper that you have written on with a pencil. You can erase what you wrote, but it will never totally be gone from that piece of paper.
If you happen to see more than usual “pop-ups”, advertisements, or “Your anti-virus has expired, Click Here to purchase a subscription… You more than likely have some sort of Spyware, or Virus in your computer. While most spyware is there to track what you are doing, most of the spyware out on the internet doesn’t actually put your personal data in jeopardy. Most spyware that is created by “Brilliant Minds” (I don’t mean that on a serious side, either) is there to get you to purchase something, or make you think you are purchasing, and then they get the money that you think you are paying to someone.
For a real workaround to any of these issues once they get bad you really need to do a System Recovery. What this does is it clears your hard drive of all information, and installs clean software back into your computer. Make sure to backup your data thoroughly, and scan your data before you put it back into your computer.
If you can’t do the necessary steps, or don’t feel comfortable, then look for a computer technician that is licensed to do business, and certified to work on computers. There are far more “Wanna-Be” computer techs on the street, and they will not only fix your computer for the most part, but they will rip you off for their services. Just because someone works in IT doesn’t mean that they know anything about the actual insides of a computer. Most IT guys just know about specific software, and not much else.
