Trojan Horse – A program that neither replicates nor copies itself, but causes damage or compromises the security of the computer. Typically, an individual emails a Trojan Horse to you-it does not email itself-and it may arrive in the form of a joke program or software of some sort. A Trojan horse can be considered a virus if it is widely redistributed.
Prevention:
1. Patch your system. Visit Windows Update website and make sure that critical updates are installed in your system.
2. Verify that all important patches are properly installed by visiting Pedestal free web-audit. You can also install any of the following free patch management tools or use a webaudit to verify that you are not missing any patches:
- Microsoft Baseline Security Analyzer
- Shavlik’s HFNetChkPro
- BigFix – supports Windows 95, 98, 2000, XP
- Pedestal WebAudit
3. Do not run any unknown or suspicious programs. If you noticed a new .exe file or documents in your system or received an e-mail with attached .exe, zip, doc etc., do not run or click it. Make sure that your system has on-access antivirus scanner. It is 100% recommended to use a antivirus that has the ability to scan incoming files especially incoming e-mails.
4. Install a firewall. If ever a trojan managed to slipped into your system, a good firewall will alert you that a file or program is trying to make a communication. Refuse the connection.
5. Install an Anti-Trojan software. It is known that not all antivirus can detect trojans. If you have extra-bucks, get a good anti-trojan software.
Removal
Go to any of the following sites that will scan, detect and clean your system for active trojans: