Ever Wonder if Virus Creators get Caught????

Well, they do if they happen to live in Morocco. Here is the story anyway:

http://www.cnn.com/2006/TECH/internet/09/13/morocco.hackers.reut/index.html

What is nice is that someone did get caught and they got punished for it. Think about the harm a virus can do to just your computer not what it can do to a companies computer network. It can cost you what well let us figure that out. Ok, first the computer doesn’t work anymore, so that is about what 1 hour of you trying to figure out why it won’t connect to the internet. Then there is the 15 minutes or so that you are arguing with your significant other that they broke the computer the last time they played solitaire on it. Then you call up your ‘computer’ friend and they diddle around for 3 hours and they have NO idea why it doesn’t work so you finally call LTOL and ask to bring it in. LTOL tells you it will take all day so you drop it off at 9am pick it up at 5pm and pay 150.00 to have it fixed. (Yes, those guys at LTOL are really nice they work on your computer for 4 hours but only charge you for two but then again they did save that picture of Bestemor Matilda that you wanted so it was worth it.)

Now, you have wasted the better part of two days getting your computer fixed all because two or three teenagers were bored, their X-box was broken and they decided to ‘make a virus’ or ‘how cool is that to do’. Plus you paid out 150.00, your significant other isn’t talking to you and you yelled at your ‘computer’ friend because he couldn’t fix it. Plus you drove back and forth to LTOL, you do now know where all those little cables go and you did find out that your computer will last at least another year and you were shown how to back up those really important files to a CD so Bestemor Matilda is safe.

What is the point of this whole little story? You probably would not have gotten the virus, worm, Trojan what have you had you just made sure that you had updated anti-virus on your computer. (Something not unlike PC-Cillin from Trend Micro which can be found as a link on this blog page or on the www.ltol.com home page under tools.) Plus you need to have the most recent updates from Microsoft. (This can also be found on the LTOL website www.ltol.com, fancy that, under the Tools link as well.) As the old saying goes, we at LTOL love old sayings by the by: An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.

Of course you also wouldn’t have gotten that virus if those two kids hadn’t been bored because the X-box was broken. So, next time? Make sure your kids are outside playing the next time the X-box breaks. Sunshine, fresh air, exercise…..ok, where is that book…..”How to Set the Timer on the VCR”.