Computer Security

Computer Security

Internet has rapidly penetrated daily lives. Today, it is not only a global reference system, but also a means of communication widely used not only for personal purposes but also for networking and commerce purposes. While the issue of Internet security has been a major concern of the experts, it has only taken a few years for the commercialization of the Internet to reach such a level that these issues will become commonplace for ordinary citizens. For protection, it is useful to know the basic concepts of computer security, and understand what it is about, and to know the simplest methods of self-defense (Vacca, 2009, pp.44-79).

The reliability of the computer system is largely based on measures of self-defense in computing filed; the concept of security is very broad. It implies the reliability of the computer, the security of valuable data and information which is protected for making modifications by unauthorized persons, and privacy of correspondence electronically. Of course, in most countries there are laws of safeguarding the citizens against losses, but in computing legal practice such laws have not yet developed, and the legislative process does not have time for the development of technology. The threats and the effects to the computer security have been faced by almost every computer user in the world. In terms of large organizations, these effects have proved to be disastrous at times (Brinkley, & Schell, 1995).

Computer virus is a code embedded in a program or document, or in certain areas of the storage medium, designed to perform unauthorized actions on the host computer. The viruses have continuously been evolving and with the advancements of technology are becoming more hard to tackle by the computer users.

The main types of computer viruses are:

* Software viruses

* Boot viruses

* Macro viruses

Software viruses are blocks of code that are deliberately embedded into other applications. When the program starts, carrying the virus, there is a start implanted in her viral code. This code is hidden from the user changes to the file structure of hard drives and / or content of the other programs (Vacca, 2009, pp.44-79). For example, the virus code can reproduce itself in the body of other programs which is a process known as breeding. By accident of time, a sufficient number of copies are automatically generated by the virus and any of these can go into destructive action which can initiate disruption of the infected programs, operating system malfunction, or removal of information stored on the hard drive. This process is called viral attack (Vacca, 2009, pp.44-79).

The most damaging viruses can initiate drive formatting. Since formatting the drive is just a long process, which should not go unnoticed by the user, in many cases limited to software, viruses destroy data only in the system hard disk sectors, equivalent to a loss of file system tables. In this case, the hard disk data are still intact, but cannot be used, as it is unknown what sectors belong to which files. Theoretically, data recovery in this case is possible, but in practice the complexity of this work is extremely high (Computer Security, 2011).

It is believed that such a virus is unable to damage the computer's hardware. However, there are times when hardware and software are so interconnected that the program has to address the replacement of damaged software. For example, most modern motherboards' basic input / output system (BIOS) is stored in the ROM of writable devices (so-called flash memory) (Gulnaz, 2011). The ability to overwrite data in flash memory chips is used by some software viruses to destroy data BIOS. In this case, the recovery of the computer requires either replacement chip that stores the BIOS or reprograms it on special devices called programmers. Software viruses enter your computer when you run un-trusted programs received on external media (floppy disk, a CD-ROM, etc.), or received via computer networks.

Boot viruses differ from software viruses in terms of ways of spreading. It does not affect the program files but certain system of magnetic media (floppy and hard disks). In addition, the computer is on, they may be temporarily placed in memory. Usually, boot viruses infect the computer when the user tries to start the computer from a magnetic medium and the system area contains virus. For example, when trying to boot from the floppy disk it is first the virus which is transferred into memory and then boot sector. Next, the computer itself becomes a source of a boot virus and it automatically copies into the system areas of floppy disks, recorded on the computer (Gulnaz, 2011).

This special type of virus infects documents executed in some applications with the means to perform the so-called macros. In particular, these documents include word processing document Microsoft Word. Infection occurs when you open a document file in the parent program if the program itself is not disabled, the possibility of execution of macros. As with other types of viruses, the result of an attack can be relatively harmful, and destructive (Schofield, 2010).

There are software glitches that can cause damage to the operating system, hardware failures that can make the hard disk unreadable. There is always the possibility that a computer with valuable data can be lost due to theft, fire or other natural disaster. Therefore creating a protection system should first be "the end" in order to prevent the devastating effects of any impact, whether it is a virus attack, theft in the room or the physical output of the hard drives. Reliable and safe operation of the computer is achieved when any unexpected event, including the complete destruction of data on the hard drive, will not lead to tangible losses (Schofield, 2010).

Computer security is an integral branch of computer technology which is also known as information security in context to networks and computer. The main objective of computer security mainly includes the protection of property and information from theft, natural disaster or corruption, while allowing the data and information to remain easily productive and accessible to its desired and intended users. The term computer security refers to the mechanism and collective processes that are used in order to preserve and protect personal information and data from being tampered, collapsed or publicized for any untrustworthy or unauthorized activity. Although computer security has problems, there are solutions.

It is quite certain to say that technologies regarding computer security are mainly based on logic. Developers of many computer applications do not generally make computer