Ed Bott

In the last month, I’ve cleaned the damn Klez virus off of three computers in my neighborhood. In each case, the person with the infected computer didn’t even know they had been hit. Of course, they had antivirus software that hadn’t been updated in more than a year, and they had never installed any updates for Windows. That’s a perfect recipe for acute viral infection. Klez and Bugbear are rampant these days. Both are particularly nasty because they can infect a computer without requiring that you open an attachment. In fact, both viruses can bypass your email program completely and jump over a network share to infect other computers — unless you’ve installed the proper Windows security patch, that is. (And this patch was released in March of 2001, for heaven’s sake, so there’s really no excuse for not having installed it!)

Now would be a good time to check your computer and see if Windows and your AV program are up to date. You can get the latest Windows patches from Windows Update. If you need antivirus software, I recommend Norton Antivirus 2003.

Looking for information about a virus? Start with the Symantec Security Response page, where you can search for viruses (old and new) and get quick information about those threats that are most prevalent right now. Click on the Klez page to download an easy-to-use utility that can help you get rid of the virus if you’ve been infected.