How do you know if your computer has a virus?

Most people don’t find out they have a virus because a warning told them. They notice the computer just isn’t right. It’s slower than it used to be, it does odd things, and it nags them with pop-ups. If a few of the signs below sound familiar, it’s worth checking.

The common signs

• The computer is slow, freezes, or crashes for no clear reason.
• Pop-up ads appear, even when you’re not in a browser.
• Your home page or search engine changed on its own.
• Programs open by themselves, or new icons turn up that you didn’t install.
• Your antivirus has been switched off and won’t turn back on.
• A laptop battery drains far faster than normal.
• The hard drive or fan is always working hard, even when you’re doing nothing.
• Files or folders have gone missing.

One of these on its own might be nothing. Three or four together usually means something is running in the background that shouldn’t be.

Where it usually comes from

Most infections arrive through a download that wasn’t what it claimed to be, an email attachment, or a fake website. Scam phone calls are a big one too. Someone rings claiming to be from Microsoft, the NBN or your bank, talks you into installing “support” software, and now they’ve been inside your computer.

What to do

If you think something’s wrong, the safest first step is to stop using the computer for banking or shopping until it’s checked. A scan with reputable antivirus software will catch the obvious infections, but the newer ones are written faster than any scanner can keep up with, so a clean scan doesn’t always mean a clean computer.

If you’d rather have someone look properly, that’s what we do. We connect remotely, go through the computer by hand, remove what’s there and tell you straight whether it was ever infected in the first place. Give us a call on 0477 319 160.