Week 3 Topic 1

[Pongthep Miankaew]

Has your own computer or computer system at your workplace been attacked by a virus/malware? Briefly explain the causes,
– where did the virus/malware come from?
– What happened to your computer or computer system?
– How to prevent virus/malware attacks again?

[Nichcha Subdee]

When I was in high school, my USB drive was attacked by a virus. I believe it got infected when I copied my assignment from a computer at school. When I plugged the USB drive into my home computer, the assignment file disappeared. This made me suspect that my flash drive had been infected with a virus. So, I decided to scan my USB drive with antivirus software and remove the virus. Fortunately, I had an antivirus program installed, so my home computer wasn’t infected by the virus I had brought from school.

[Soe Htike]

The desktop computer at my previous office was attacked by “recycler” malware once. After CD/DVD era, People started using USBs to transfer files to and from the office desktop and their computers or to print their documents via the desktop. The malware hid the files in the office computer, especially the important documents. It took a lot of time to recover, affecting our work productivity.
Since then, we have the computer protected with licensed Kaspersky antivirus software and USB disk security (which was famous at that time). We made sure all the USBs must be scanned with these two security measures. We started using cloud drive links in the emails to minimize the risk of USB viruses and malwares.

[Suppasit Srisaeng]

I experienced a malware attack that was fortunately detected and prevented by my antivirus software. It’s unclear where the malware originated, but it could have come from a suspicious email or compromised website. To prevent future attacks, I’m keeping my antivirus updated, being cautious with downloads and links, and educating others in my network about safe online practices.

[Phyo]

My personal computer was attacked by viruses several times😊. Before I had a proper job, I tried to download medical books or cracked versions of softwares (Adobe Acrobat, games, etc.) from Torrents. As you know, some books and softwares are pretty expensive I can’t afford to. The last time my computer was affected by the virus, the Windows operating system no longer worked. I can’t do anything with my computer even accessing the local drive folder. I didn’t know what kind of virus it was. My friend helped me to recover the folders from D Drive only.
Since I had a job, I have purchased Malwarebytes Premium to protect my computer. It has been working well and I don’t have any serious malicious attack after all. I also buy essential softwares and books online instead of pirated versions.

[Ching To Chung]

While I have never been attacked by serious trojan horses and viruses, my computer was infected with spyware when I downloaded some sketchy Chinese software that was free (I forgot what it was for, but the fact that it could do what I needed made it attractive enough for me to download it). It then hijacked many things in my computer. For example, changing the homepage in my browser and installing unknown extensions, showing pop-up ads all the time, and significantly slowing the start-up time. It also ran in the background and suspiciously took up storage and internet usage. It was such a hassle for me to get rid of it, because the attacker designed it such that it is very difficult for a clean uninstallation. I had to look through many tutorials online just to get rid of every residual file and reverse the damage. To prevent something like this from happening again, I think it is important to only download and install softwares from reputable sources. Don’t download softwares that you don’t trust simply because of convenience. Alternatively, there is also the sandbox function in Windows 10, which allows users to try running an executable file in a virtual machine environment. This enables you to test whether a software is safe or not before running in on your real computer.

[Teeraboon Lertwanichwattana]

I’ve faced multiple instances of malware attacks while attempting to download cracked applications from unreliable websites. Despite having antivirus software in place, my system was still compromised by the malware, leading to performance disruptions and the appearance of unwanted advertisements. To safeguard against future attacks, my approach now involves exclusively sourcing downloads from trustworthy origins, maintaining up-to-date software, and refraining from interacting with dubious links. This occurrence underscored the significance of adhering to internet safety protocols.

[Pyae Thu Tun]

Since our personal or workplace computers are a part of a global network system, those have the risk of being attacked by viruses or malware. With the increased technology, those kinds of cyberattacks are becoming powerful nowadays. Sometimes we could not even trace where it comes from and what has caused the system damage. As my colleagues mentioned, I was frequently persuaded by this kind of malware, trojans from online links that pop up during browsing or downloading the cracked version of expensive software and tools. Luckily, the system was not seriously affected apart from the annoying folder missing and hiding by itself. It was easily solved with Norton antivirus software which was really popular at that time. However, in the organization where I am currently working, most of the risks are already prevented since the IT team controls all the devices by limiting the user role and installing only authentic software. But we still also faced potential threats mostly from spam mail which resembles the mail sent from the headquarters’ official address mentioning that we need to update some personal info for updating the database and security. Conducting cybersecurity awareness training for all employees will ensure we understand the risks of phishing and know how to recognize and report suspicious emails.

[Panyada Cholsakhon]

I have experience virus attacking my computer several times many years ago. It showed as the window continuously copying itself and I couldn’t stop it. Apart from that sometimes when I am working on my computer, it was suddenly turned to blue screen without warning. I think it happened because I was not aware when I download some programs from the internet.The way to prevent this situation is keep updating the computer’s antivirus and operation system, only install the official programs and applications, and do not download programs or applications, or open the link or files that are suspicious of malware.

[Myat Htoo Linn]

There have been a number of security and system attacks by viruses and malware on my computer, especially since I started using the laptop and mobile devices. The one I remember well is copying the files from the internet shops to my laptop through a USB drive, where the virus came across my laptop and infected it. This infected a lot of the original files that were already on the laptop, as the files were unreadable or caused errors when I tried to access them, but I couldn’t notice the type of virus. This caused data loss without knowing how to recover it, and the lucky thing was that I only had some data on the laptop at that time.
I could not let it happen again and was always cautious about transferring the files, downloading, opening, and clicking the attachments and links from insecure sources. I will also try to prevent malware attacks by updating the security system on the operating system, running the anti-virus software up to date, using reputable antivirus and anti-malware software, practicing safe browsing habits, and performing regular data backup.

[Thitikan Pohpoach]

Of course, I think we all have experienced the attack at least once. When I was in college, the screen just turned blue and shut itself down. The possible cause I could think of was downloading information from an untrusted site. Nowadays, I have tried to prevent it by updating the antivirus program and backing up the important data.

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