Topic6

Topic 6
Issues related to viruses on both stand-alone and network systems by HeeJun Son

In these days, every computer is very vulnerable to computer virus. Internet is everywhere. As the world is connected by the network system and computers do all the things for people, the economical damage caused by the computer virus is immense. Not only computers control the business system, but they also do control the transport and traffic systems. If the computers are harmed by the viruses, the consequences will be enormous as many news articles tell us a lot of people get disadvantage from the viruses.

1. What are the issues associated with this subject?

As they became existing everywhere, viruses have become the major problems in these days. They replicate themselves in the computer and alter operation system without any owner’s consent. People even get their information stolen and viruses utterly destroy a computer. There are many kinds of viruses: boot sector viruses, companion viruses, email viruses, macro viruses, cross-site scripting virus, etc. They are programmed to damage the computer by altering programs, deleting files, or reformatting the hard disk. The viruses have bugs leading to data loss or more serious problems. Malwares are slightly different from viruses although most people assume they are the same things. Malwares are made to destroy a computer system. Trojan horses and worms are the common examples of malwares.

5. What solutions can overcome the problem?

The easiest way to solve the virus problem is not to allow the virus to spread out of control at the first place. Unfortunately, in the Internet, it is harder to prevent viruses from sneaking in. The anti-virus program may be one of the good choices to get rid of viruses from the computers. However, it also removes a good virus. The problems of this kind are traditionally more difficult to solve than the technical ones. However the anti-virus softwares may help greatly to solve those problems associated with destroying the computer system. And we should not install any suspicious program on our computer.

8. What are the ethical issues?

It is unethical to change other people’s data without their permit. Computer viruses change the information on the computer. Therefore they are illegal and unethical. Some viruses having malicious intent can steal personal important information and erase the whole data in the hardware. Sometimes the stolen information can be posted on the web. If that is a case, anyone is possible to see his or her personal important information. Anybody who sees that on the web can abuse it. Thus the virus problems have caused ethical issues.

9. Who is responsible?

Many people believe that only a few people who have great knowledge of computer programming can create computer viruses, perhaps like an intelligent computer programmer. But creating virus is not as hard as most people may think if you properly understand how the program works. People make viruses because mainly they want to feel the thrill or to show off their special talents. If a person knows how to make programs, he or she will easily make destructive viruses that spread very quickly. People create the viruses because they also want something beneficial from someone. As we can see the people who are good at programming and have a bad purpose are responsible the problems of viruses